


vādō mēcum (go with me)

by thefangirlofhp



Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Author Is Sleep Deprived, Domestic Bliss, Domestic Fluff, Elriel, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family Fluff, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Found Family, Hurt/Comfort, Modern Era, Nightmares, One Shot, Originally Posted on Tumblr, POV Azriel (ACoTaR), Sleep Paralysis, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, prompts, seer elain, shadowsinger
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-17
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:08:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 49,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23185288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefangirlofhp/pseuds/thefangirlofhp
Summary: "If I find in myself a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most logical explanation is that I was made for another world".A collection of one-shots focused mainly on ElainxAzriel (Elriel) with a few other side pairings. Originally posted on Tumblr.
Relationships: Elain Archeron & Azriel, Elain Archeron/Azriel
Comments: 11
Kudos: 47





	1. It's all right, I'm right here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (in which they’re there for each other, Azriel’s nightmares winning and Elain’s sleep paralysis coming back)

***him;**

Her soft voice is the one thing that cuts through the thoughts in his mind; abruptly chasing away suffocating thoughts that were cutting off air from his body; like a lit candle banishing the darkness; a flame in a storm of snow. His eyes snap open as she repeats the words, over and over like an offered sanctuary, staring up at the darkness inking the ceiling of their bedroom. Shadows curl in his peripheral vision, whispering in his ears, at the edges of his consciousness; working with her, working with their opposite.

“It’s all right, Az. It’s all right. I’m here. I’m right here, darling. Look at me. Az, look at me.”

Gentle chilly wind blows in through the opened windows, curtains billowing in a dance with it, shadows mimicking the movement. In the starless night, his demons reach for his mind as he sleeps. He’s so afraid; petrified selfishly for himself down to his core; so terrified of something but his mind can’t put a finger to it. Only that there’s something in his head scaring him, forcing nightmares of confusion onto him.

Her hands touch his clenched jaw, then reach for his clenched fists and her dainty fingers pry them open as he grits down on his teeth and his whole body just trembles. Shaking, terrified, trembling on the mattress. His eyes water up and he chokes on a sob as Elain’s face comes into his vision. Her beautiful face is folded into concern and heartbroken grief as she looks at him, he feels her hands easing his tightly clenched fists, offering a streak of bravery to him. You’re not alone, her eyes wordlessly say but his shadows whisper it to him. I’m here and I care.

His chest caves in, he gasps open for a breath his muscles had refused to inhale, and she nods encouragingly. Her long hair falls unbound from her head, tickling his forearm- every touch telling him this is real. This is all right. She takes his face in her hands, doe eyes soft and seeing well past the hazel of his eyes and the emotion in them. “It’s okay, Az. It’s okay.”

A sob escapes him as he reaches out for her, desperate for comfort; for ease; for an end. He sobs into her shoulder when she pulls him into her, hugs him tight and secure and rocks their intertwined torsos back and forth.

“It’s all right, muffin. It’s all right. I’m here. I’m here for you. You can cry on me.”

His face contorts in anguish as he lets out a strangled cry in her shoulder.

* * *

***her;**

Her eyes snap open in alarm. It’s happening again.

No, no, no, she thinks immediately. Panic claws its way up her throat, along with her voiceless cry, and takes over her whole paralyzed body. Her lips, glued together, tremble against one another as her whole face twitches and remains in place. She inhales sharply through her nose and tries to make the exhale through her lips a shout. It doesn’t. Tears roll down her cheeks into the roots of her hair.

A muffled rough cry tears through her vocal cords as she panics, her whole body frozen stiff and refusing of her mind’s commands. Again, it’s happening again.

A moment after she’s woken up paralyzed from her sleep, the weight on the bed next to her shifts and she tries again- that hurtful rough cry through her throat and sealed shut lips. It works; Azriel immediately stirs at the noise.

“’Lain? Wh- oh. Hey, hey, look at me,” his hands find her head and she latches her eyes onto his face as he looks down at her. “Look at me, it’s all right. You’re all right. Match my breathing, come on,” he takes one of her hands and rubs it between his as she cries some more. He is kneeling next to her, massaging her hand and the other stroking her forehead soothingly. “Come on. With me. In,” he takes a deep breath, his eyes never once leaving hers and she does. “Hold it. And out.”

Elain exhales through her nose with him. A stream flows from her eyes into her hair and his hand never stops massaging her own- working to combat that empty hallow feeling of nothing. She feels nothing, her whole body’s asleep, and it is more than terrifying waking up with no feel to yourself.

“Come on, love, focus. Stay with me.” He works her fingers, the wedding band on one twisting. She tries to match his breathing, tries to dispel the panic that’s slowly being placated thanks to him being awake and helping her. She tries to shout, but it’s drowned in her throat. He nods anyway, and smooths his rough palm on her forehead.

Everything’s dark, the whole room encased in it save for the moonlight coming in through the windows. A side of his face is illuminated by it, letting her focus on the features of his face.

“Listen to them,” he croons softly and she can slowly feel his fingers doing their work. Shadows curl around them, at her sides. She hears their hiss in her ear, calm voices with nothing to say but to calm her. “It’s all right. I’m right here.”

Her lips tug and twitch and she finally begins to be able to move her face. His brow furrows deeply as she sobs, an understanding expression worn on his face. “I know, love. It’s all right. I’m here. I’m right here. Look at me, Ellie. It’s wearing off. Give it a moment, love.”

Then her lips peel from each other and she gasps sharply as her whole body suddenly jumps to action. A screaming cry escapes her throat as she sits up abruptly, arms stretching out towards him as she falls into his lap and embrace.

Elain sobs into his chest.

“I’ve got you,” he murmurs. She feels his hands on her back, rubbing circles into it as he buries his face in her hair. “I’ve got you.”

She shakes in his arms and sobs.


	2. “I’m a monster.”     “No, you are not.”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (in which Azriel has his doubts, Elain has Seen him coming home and stays awake to greet him home)

She was sitting in the balcony for the past hour, dressed for bed and all ready to retire for the night. She’s waiting patiently though for the winged husband to fly back to their nest. It was a cool crisp night, the air pleasant against her lean neck and the sound of the sea a soothing noise in her ears. She sits curled in the outdoors lounge chair, smoothing her fingers over the fabric of her nightgown on her knees and patiently waits.

An hour and two later, she hears the pattern of beating wings and her lips stretch into a familiar smile as her heart leaps in joy. _He’s back,_ her whole conscious sings, _he’s back home._

She spots his figure in the skies, descending in the familiar track restricted to only him and his abilities and she gets to her feet when he flies onto the balcony. He folds his wings tightly before noticing her and doubling back in surprise.

“Hi,” she says, a little breathlessly and a lot happy. There’s something in his eyes she can’t identify in the dark but it doesn’t stop her from stepping up to him with the smile reserved only for him. His face softens and he places a kiss on her brow.

“Hey. I thought you’d be fast asleep. It’s late.”

“I waited for you,” she wraps her arms around his waist and looks up at him, his softened face and the question written on it. She smiles gently. “I knew you’ll be back tonight.”

His eyes crinkle at the corners as he smiles down at her. “What did you see?”

She tightens her arms around him. “This,” she answers and kisses his chin.

He sighs into her hair and leans against her. It’s all due to their in-tune souls and her knowing him enough that she recognizes the exhaustion of a different kind in him. This night won’t be like others when he comes back, nights of sweet love and kisses, but something different. When she looks into his eyes again, eyes flickering between his, she realizes why she’s Seen it.

“Let’s get you inside,” she whispers softly, wrapping her hand around his elbow. “I’ll make you something to eat.”

He exhales softly and lets her lead them into their bedroom. She lights the fae-light, illuminating the room and to take a better look at him. His shadows are wrapped tightly around his form like a comfort blanket.

She reaches a hand that cups his cheek, watching the black wisps run away from her touch and she takes a good look at him.

His face is pale, drawn and sullen. Her eyes flicker to the muscle in his neck that jumps out as he clenches his jaw. She cocks her head slightly to the side, meeting his hazel eyes, the question present in her eyes.

“Something at the border,” he replies hoarsely. Her eyebrows jump together, forming a slight furrow between them and she chances a look at his hands. Silvery red blood cakes his ruined appendages and he subconsciously wipes them against the black leather of his tunic.

She realizes it’s a touch darker than usual and there are flecks of the blood on the first bit of skin that peeks over the collar of it. Elain brushes her thumbs against his cheeks and slides her hands off them.

“Let’s clean you up.”

In the bathroom, he sits heavily at the edge of the bathtub and watches her move around the space. “No, I’ll do it,” she says when he makes to take the water bowl and towel from her.

“It was a nymph,” he croaks as he watches her wipe away the blood with the soaked towel. She looks up at him briefly, listening. Just listening.

When he can’t find anymore words to say, she says quietly; “I thought nymphs weren’t aggressive?”

“They aren’t,” he shakes his head. “This- she was cursed. Her kin couldn’t kill her. But she kept slipping from their watch to wreak chaos, slaughter people. They begged me to heal her. I tried.”

“That’s why you took so long.”

He nods, feeling his lower back muscles clench and unclench rapidly. “I tried everything I knew. It only made her worse and it hurt her. She kept screaming as I tortured her. Then she begged me to stop and I thought it worked somehow. The moment her kin let down their guard she lashed out and killed one. I acted immediately.”

Elain’s brown doe-eyes met his as he felt his resolve crumbling.

“I’ve done this for centuries, and it doesn’t bother me,” he admits softly. “Still, this time was different; she wasn’t under her own control. She wasn’t malicious. My help was torture to her. When I drove Truth-Teller in her, it felt anything but truth or the right thing. Her eyes cleared for one moment before she died and I knew she was herself, because for one moment she looked scared and confused. And frightened of me.”

Elain drags the towel over his palm gently then dips it in the bowl and squeezes the excess from it. She looks contemplative, choosing her words carefully. “When I drove Truth-Teller into the King of Hybern, it felt incredibly wrong. I was angry and furious in the moment, but even as I stopped him from killing my sister and your brother, it felt wrong and I felt like I violated something sacred in the world. But why?”

She rubs a spot gently and goes on. “The most awful man in the world and when I rid it of him, for someone else, I felt filthy and deformed. I couldn’t understand why; my father was dead because he killed him, there were soldiers on both sides dying. Countless men and faeries dying because of his selfishness and war but when I killed him, I felt no better than him. Even if by doing something evil, I’d achieved a greater good. Evil is evil, I thought. Greater or lesser.

“I still don’t understand,” she says softly, looking at him. He watches her hungrily, taking in every word that spills from her lips with the thirst of a thirsty man in a dessert. “Why. But when I did it, it finished a war, right? It saved lives. It nurtured goodness and made the flowers in our garden grow. By doing something terrible, I had made the world a much better place. What I’m saying, Az, it shouldn’t feel right. To kill anyone, no matter how wicked. There’s arrogance in thinking ridding the world of someone is the right thing, because we’re assuming knowledge we can never have and we’re passing judgement we are in no place to make.

“It’s wrong to take something as precious as a life,” she abandons the warm towel in his palm to cup his cheek with her wet hand. He leans against her palm, watching her, quenching the aching sorrow in his chest. “And it’s good that you feel it isn’t right. We can only make the decisions we are least likely to regret doing, and only hope it brings more goodness into the world. And it’s incredibly noble to do the wrong thing to save the right thing.”

His eyes flutter shut for a few moments. “I’m a monster,” he admits softly.

“No,” she rebukes, equally softly. “You are not. Just a noble soul.”

His throat bobs as he swallows something thick building in his throat. When he opens his eyes again, Elain is looking at him with the same gentle loving look in her eyes. “When I was human, we called this the human nature,” she says with a smile. “This conflict, this guilt- it’s all humanity. And it’s good. And I think, you’re more human than I used to be.”

His eyes well up with tears and his lips twitch in a sad smile.

Elain’s eyes brighten with her own unshed tears. “I was never frightened of you a day in my life, Az.”

Her words crack a dam in his composure, and he rests his forehead against hers. Elain shakily exhales, her hand rising to his dark hair and fondly going through it. He blinks away the hotness in his eyes rapidly as she picks the towel with a hand and wipes the remaining blood away. When she is finished, she sets them in the bathtub and holds his wrists tenderly, then kisses the spot his scars fade from his palms; the first place his skin feels keenly like the rest of his body. She then kisses the scar tissue of his two palms, the skin he cannot feel, and rests her cheeks in them, smiling waterly at him.

Tears singularly spilling slowly from his eyes, he leans forward and kisses the corner of her mouth then her cheek, cupping her face.

She leans against him as he does, resting her hands on his knees touching hers. He exhales softly, and thinks this is the one thing he will never give up in the world.


	3. Please hold me.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (in which Az muffin is the dream partner anyone who gets their period wants)

Azriel climbs the stairs quietly on socked feet, the cat Nala following his steps with a lazy pace. She saunters between his legs as he moves onto the landing, and struts before him with her tail erected high in the air. He smiles at her happy state, and follows her as she walks into his and Elain’s bedroom.

It’s a room of neutral colours, courtesy of Elain’s touches. Cream colours, pastel-like shades of beige, orange, wood, the occasional blue and gold. He has never thought of decorating a room like Elain has, but –he admits happily- it works spectacularly and whenever he is in it, a sense of calmness and peace washes over him.

Elain chose this room not for its wide space, but for the large balcony and large windows that allow inside an abundance of healthy sunlight, something she admitted she loved immensely. The furniture was all by her choice- he remembers trailing after her like a loyal puppy in the Palaces as she eagerly set about to decorate their new home following their nuptial. He could barely catch up with her as she went from shop to shop, occasionally looking back at him with a golden smile, an _“Az, hurry up!”_ , and a contagious laugh.

He had never seen her as happy as she was after their marriage, and it obviously rubbed off on him because whenever he greets anyone a good morning, he actually means it with all his heart. The shop owners love her, as if anyone wouldn’t, and were so eager to fulfill her desires. Somehow, she had an exact image of what their home had to look like (he doesn’t doubt it’s from her gift) and it was a problem to get a carpenter to capture exactly what she had in mind. She wasn’t disheartened, though, confident and sure. She would only grab Azriel by the arm, thank the shop owner and bound out of the shop to the next, almost dragging her newlywed husband with her who was laden with objects Elain purchased.

In the end, he offered to build whatever she had in mind and the look that took over her face would be the gem he conjures forever in his low moments when he’s away from her. She thanked him over and over and granted him a passionate kiss that made him dizzy, then ran to fetch paper and a pen to start her plans.

When Cassian caught him visiting carpenters and merchants on behalf of his wife, he was nonplussed why Az would be placing orders for oak, maple, mahogany, teak, walnut, cherry and birch and why his friend would be shopping for carpenter tools. When Azriel told him, Cassian whistled then doubled over laughing.

“You’ve got it bad, brother. You’re building the furniture yourself for her? That’s some deep shit there. I don’t think even Rhys has gone that far for Feyre. Do you even know how to make furniture?”

Azriel swallowed then and shrugged. “How hard could it be?”

The answer would be very, very hard and it was long sleepless nights of battling with saws and wood and cursing himself silly as he worked late in the night and bargained his sanity to get things right for his Elain. In the end, it was worth it, so very much worth it knowing he had put all this effort for his beloved, and knowing they would live in this place for the rest of their foreseeable future and every time Elain would think of it, she’d be reminded of his never-ending love for her. 

His queen is asleep on the bed, cushioned by plush cushions and thick soft blankets (she’d gone wild with them, sheepishly spending an alarming amount of money on these comforts to put almost everywhere in the house- and who was he to deny his Seer anything?), buried between them all save for her streaming long hair all over her pillow that signals she is there. Azriel carefully swings the door into its frame, and walks to her side of the bed, setting the tray he carries onto her bedside- that design on it had made him nearly loose four fingers and he’s sure there’s a stain of his blood on a drawer.

She looks a vision from heaven; a true princess. Her face clear, smooth, and peaceful as she steadily inhales and exhales, her hands tucked under her head and quietly slumbering. He is loath to interrupt her peace, but he has been informed of the necessity of administering the tonic early to ease the rest of her week or so.

“Elain,” he croons softly, his scarred fingers brushing back strands of her hair behind her ear. “Love.”

An impossibly soft smile starts on her lips and he feels himself swoon. He places his hand on her head, then touches her chin with the other. “Love, wake up.”

Her eyebrows reach for each other, a cute furrow between them as she inhales deeply then her eyes open slowly. He smiles when he is allowed the sight of those lovely doe eyes, and cocks his head to the side.

Pathetic love takes over ever muscle, fiber, bone, tissue and inch of himself when a smile blooms on her lips. She blinks sleepily at him. “Hmmm.”

“Wake up,” he tickles her chin and watches her nose crinkle the way that makes his heart scream upon her doing so. “Sleepy head. Come on, you hibernating bear cub.”

She huffs a laugh. “But I’m so comfortable like this.”

“I know,” he says sympathetically. “But it’s a comfort we have to sacrifice to placate the coming pain. Take your tonic and go back to sleep.”

“All right,” she sleepily sits up, with his assistance and a wince passes over her face. He glances at her groin region, glad that her nightdress isn’t sullied. They woke up two hours ago at the crack of dawn to Elain writhing in unbelievable pain, clutching her belly and moaning. Azriel would have lost his mind at the unbelievable amount of blood soaking the mattress beneath her had he not quickly put two and two together. While she cleaned up in the bathroom, he changed the sheets and covers, put them in the washing bin to clean later, and helped her sort herself out.

“Eat something first,” he offers her some toasted bread to have before the tonic. He was told it is incredibly strong and its side effects more powerful when it wasn’t diluted with something in the stomach before it.

“Thank you,” she eats the dry toast as quickly as she can, under his watchful and careful gaze. She smiles as she chews when she catches him staring and he feels a blush forming on his cheeks at the knowing gleam in her eyes. Azriel loves every moment of taking care of her, the way she does in return to him, and loves beating her in that aspect. He feels accomplished as he looks over her, hands her lukewarm water to wash down the toast with and as he strokes her hair. He doesn’t need an irresistible bond to pull him to her, and doesn’t want it.

This only. This companionship between them, the mutual care, the tender loving, the sense of equality between them, the feeling of belonging to each other beyond any outer interference because they chose one another- it is all he wants in his immortal life.

There is a kind of gleaming life in Elain’s eyes that he has never seen before in the eye of an immortal; he hasn’t seen it in the eyes of any human either. She looks at the whole world as one precious thing, values life in every form and shape, and he wonders what she Sees sometimes beyond her visions; as if her Sight gives her the ability to look into something and see what others can’t. Elain’s previous mortality, her characteristic kindness that hasn’t been in anyone the way it is in her, sticks with her in her immortality so she values time more than an immortal ever has. It’s wisdom beyond her years- to never degrade time’s value because of its endless abundance. She doesn’t degrade anything’s value, no matter how abundant. Azriel sometimes wonders if it is her upbringing influencing her into doing so.

She’s the miracle of his life; that for sure he knows. The companion he desperately needs by his side all the time, one to brave the endless time with him, to make every second count despite it never being their last. She completes him, his shadows work in sync with her- whenever she’s there they take their leave of him, as if knowing he’s in safe hands. He doesn’t need cautionary whispers in his ear or endless details of his surroundings when he is with her, the safest haven he knows.

Elain takes the tonic and downs it in one go, grimacing at the abhorring taste and coughing delicately into her elbow. He runs a hand down her back and gives her the handkerchief on her bedside that she then coughs into.

“Thank you,” Elain exhales, rubbing her sore belly. “I miss my dreadful human cycles sometimes.”

“I hear these are brutal,” he gets into the bed with her, and pulls the blankets higher over them. Nala leaps gracefully onto the mattress, circles lazily for a few moments before she settles into the patch of warm sunlight on the blanket, right over Azriel’s legs. He opens his arms for Elain who eagerly settles against his chest, twisting and turning until her body finds a position that doesn’t make her ache. He loves the gentle weight of her head against his shoulder as she leans herself back against him in the lock of his arms and her constant presence.

“They are,” she admits, running a hand over the forearm locked over her middle; Azriel smiles into the shell of her ear and kisses it in response. “I’m glad Feyre was with me the first time. I thought I was dying.”

“We can’t have that,” he tusks into her neck.

“I get why they’re necessary, though,” she says, leaning back against him and wincing. He brings the blankets closer around them, allowing their toasty heat to seep into her. His wings twitch to wrap her like a blanket, but the sunlight would do her more good than shielding her from it. “In both forms. I know they’re a sign I’m healthy and that my womb is still ready to have children.”

“Is it?” he asks, surprised.

“What? Oh, yes. The bleeding is my womb shedding its layered wall with the absence of a child.”

He blinks, bewildered. “Your body punishes you for not conceiving a child?”

Elain starts laughing against him, making him feel incredibly unknowledgeable. She winces when she laughs, tensing against him and pressing a hand to her belly- where her unforgiving womb is, Azriel supposes.

“Please don’t make me laugh,” she says in a rushed tone. “I don’t want to get up so soon.”

“I’ll help you,” he replies dismissively. “What were you saying about your womb being cruel?”

“No, Az,” her lips draw back in a precious smile, revealing her clean teeth. “Or at least, you can look at it that way. I mean, it’s just a natural response to not giving it what it’s created for.”

“What do you know,” he murmurs, his chin resting on her shoulder. “I never thought it was like that. I just… I thought it was like peeing, to be honest.”

He feels her back tremble with suppressed laughter. “Really? Why do you think me- males don’t have it?”

He shrugs, tracing her elbow with a non-feeling finger. “Being beautiful has different effects on our bodies? I never thought about it this deep, Elain.”

She grins and turns to hold his eyes for a moment. “You’re unbelievable. I am the luckiest woman on the earth to have you. I mean- female.”

“You know, it doesn’t make much of a difference,” he assures her. “Referring to yourself as a woman or a female. Or fae males as men. No one notices it until you correct yourself. You still get the meaning across.”

“It _is_ weird,” she admits, then yawns, hiding behind her palm. “Oh Az, I don’t suppose it would hurt to sleep for a bit more? I think the tonic’s catching up with me.”

He smiles at her voice turning slower and heavier. He kisses her cheek in response. “Sleep all you want, love. I’ll stay here.”

She turns in his hold to lean her side against his front instead and curl into his chest. “Please hold me,” she whispers as she closes her eyes. He smiles impossibly wider.

“Always.” 


	4. Your silence will not protect you. PART 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (in which the fawn is hunted by kings and kingdoms and Death is not at all pleased with his fawn being in danger)

Elain stares up at the face of the King of Vallahan.

He is tall, taller than her by a generous amount, and his young face examines her own carefully. “Are you certain this is her?” he asks the spymaster at his right.

The short spymaster straightens his already straight posture, hands clasped behind him and his bright eyes fix themselves on her. “I’m certain. My spies are well informed.”

Her gaze flicks back to the King’s gaze and he extends a hand. “I am King Lucius of Vallahan. I would like to welcome you into my court and kingdom, Elain Archeron, as a guest.” He gestures to the wide ballroom for a throne room, his own impressive throne at the end of the hall. No courtiers were present, save for the three of them in the empty echoing room.

She does not accept his offered hand. “I should think that as a guest I wouldn’t have been taken against my will from my home, Your Highness.”

His face turns sharper as he studies her and he lowers his hand. “You will forgive me, Kingslayer, for having to take drastic measures to extract you from the wicked hell of the Night Court. My spymaster has been looking for ways to bring you out for over a year now.”

“I like to believe a simple invitation would have sufficed.”

The King exchanges a glance with the spymaster. She almost huffs; he is nowhere close to Azriel’s talents. “We were reluctant on revealing our intention to your keepers.”

“Keepers?”

“The High Lord and Lady of the Night Court,” he clarifies. “I hear they are masters of deceit and mind-twisting. I am trying not to garner their attention. I am sure your _sister_ would never let you leave her sight.”

She clasps her hands together. “I fail to see what this has to do with my presence here.”

One moment she was in a green, lush meadow in the woods, enjoying the sunlight of the spring day and the chilly wind, and the next thing she knew, she was being abducted and stolen.

“Your gifts are legendary by now,” he starts, gesturing to the long table set in the middle of the large throne room. She follows as he takes the seat at the head of the table, his spymaster at his right and she his left. Wine and food appear before them. She doesn’t touch it. “Elain Kingslayer, Cauldron-Blessed, Seer of the Night Court. Word travels very fast.”

“I see. Why am I here?”

He exchanges looks with his spymaster once again and clears his throat delicately. “Lady Elain, our conflict with Montesere has no doubt, not escaped your notice.”

“Perhaps it has.”

He exchanges another look with his spymaster. “I was told you were renown for your kindness. I hope I can convince you to show some, to my kingdom.”

She stares at him. He continues on.

“My kingdom has been fighting this battle for long years, and the war has taken a toll on both sides. I am afraid nothing but a firm quashing of Montesere would quell this war, seeing as peace negotiations have gone poorly. I wish to end this bloodshed without much more.”

“I am listening.”

“With your gifts, we could land a series of well-timed blows that would end this war in a few months, as I believe. We require your assistance- your Sight.”

She looks down at the tabletop, fingering the fine tablecloth. It was smooth, and fine material; perhaps she can convince Az to get it for her, or she can persuade Rhys into importing it to Velaris. Or, she thinks instead, she could build this connection between the two kingdoms and enjoy an endless amount of spoils of friendship. Azriel has been promising her a trip to the cities she’s only heard of, but so far her husband hasn’t been able to uphold his promise with his work.

She inwardly sighs.

“No,” she says finally. Looking up, she is met with the surprised faces of the two High Fae, but they’re not unexpecting of this. “I do not think I will. I don’t lend my support to end bloodshed with more bloodshed.”

“If you refuse, you will be allowing it to continue.”

“And if I agree, I will be contributing to it,” she says with a tone of finality and stands up. “I do not think I will be doing so.”

“It is the lesser evil, Lady.”

“Evil is evil,” she repeats from memory. “Lesser, greater. If I have to choose between a greater evil and a lesser one, then I rather not choose at all.”

“You may not have a choice,” he says quietly. She does not miss the threatening tone. Instead, she pushes back her shoulders and crosses her arms over her chest.

“I demand to be returned to the Night Court.”

“Oh,” King Lucius shakes his head. “I am afraid we cannot do that. I have worked hard to obtain you here. I will not be letting you go, or the freedom of my people that easily.”

“Easily or not,” she speaks softly. “You will take me back.”

He leans back in his chair and crosses an ankle over his knee. “I do not think I will.”

“The High Lord and Lady-“

“Will do absolutely _nothing_ if they value your safety and wellbeing. I wonder, can you see what awaits you should you refuse my offer as you are doing now?”

“Perfectly,” she grounds out, clenching her hands.

“Then I must also wonder, how loud do you scream, Lady Elain, when my torturers are driving ash blades into your joints?”

She blinks. He smiles.

“I thought so,” he says. “I will give you a day to consider my offer. Choose wisely, otherwise, I have no use for you.”

“If you touch me-“

“I have no interest in hurting you unless it is necessary to make you understand, Lady Elain.”

“I don’t want to help you,” she insists. “You can’t convince me otherwise. Do you want a prophecy? Here it is: I will _not_ help you.”

The King’s eyes flash dangerously. “I do not wish to do this. But you leave me no choice- my people shall have to come first. Take her away.”

She whirls around to see two guards taking her by the elbow. So they weren’t as alone as she presumed. They tug at her elbow, and she looks at the King one final time; “You will regret this.”

“I will regret not doing this.”

____

They put her in an underground cell with no source of light save for the flickering faelight outside her small cell. She sits curled in the corner of her bare cell, brushing her tied hair with her fingers and wishing she has a comb with her to sort out the knots. When she grows bored of yanking at her hair, she picks at her nails and taps her fingers against her knees.

Elain brushes down the skirts of her pale blue dress, noting all the places the skirts are soiled and dirty and works out how she’s going to get rid of them. She was fond of this dress; it was essentially plain, just a simple design with long sleeves and flowing skirts, the only feature of fashion about it being the multiple skirts and their different shades.

After a few hours sitting in the dark, she spreads her hands before her and her lips curl as she watches shadow wisps curl around her palms and their chill tickling her skin. She smiles at them, then batts them away when they start fussing over her state worriedly. She chases some out of her hair and wraps her arms around her knees, watching their antics in the dark amused.

She’s paid a visit after several hours by the spymaster- she has probably missed dinner. She was hoping to try her hand at casserole to master today for Az, with her new spices obtained from the Palaces. But her plans had to be ruined by meddling spymasters and desperate kings.

King Lucien is desperate, she relies on that fact alone. She has been told how frantic he is to stop the bloodshed that has been draining his resources and kingdom, and though she takes no comfort in sucking someone dry, she has no intention of participating in bloodshed.

The spymaster stares her down and sets his torch on a handle hammered to the cold stone wall of her cell. She rests her head against the wall behind her and hopes she doesn’t catch a cold from this climate and fall sick.

“I will have to tell you how frantic the King is to win this war,” he begins with caution in his voice. “And that he will do anything to put an end to it.”

“With him as the victor,” she notes.

“We have not shed all this blood to yield now, Lady. High Lord Rhysand gave his life to put an end to the conflict, and King Lucien will go further.”

“Mine, you mean?” she cocks an eyebrow high. “I don’t care for thinly veiled threats, spymaster. I don’t care for threats at all. You cannot frighten me.”

“Truly? Is it the Seer in you speaking or the naïve human girl under the illusion of being protected by her High Lord and Lady?

She smiles faintly. “Both.”

He opens his mouth to talk more and she cuts him off, “Don’t bother, Spymaster. It is the unknown we only fear while looking upon darkness, nothing more. And I know some things you don’t. You cannot frighten me into submission or into doing anything against my will.”

“What of your sisters, then? Can I frighten you into agreeing for the sake of their safety?”

She chuckles, wrapping her arms around her shoulders to keep in the warmth as she shivers. “You can try, Spymaster. I am the weakest of them. If you can’t break me, you can never hope to touch them.”

“Do you fear pain, then, Seer?” he says quietly, stepping closer.

“Of course I do. Everyone-“

He backhands her across the face. Her head snaps violently to the side, her skull clanking against the stone wall. The shock of the blow leaves her dizzy and stunned, her head spinning in circles. She touches her fingers to her numb lips, and doesn’t feel her touch. Her mind races to placate the raging shadows the spymaster doesn’t seem to notice.

“Tomorrow morning,” the spymaster speaks as if reading her the life sentence assigned to her. “You will be given the last chance to join our cause. After that, I would not like to be present to see what is left of you, little rose.”

She stares back at him silently. She slowly blinks. “I’d like a blanket, please.”

He thinks about it, then shakes his head and turns to stalk out of the cell. “Agree and you’ll be given all the luxuries you’ve ever dreamt of.”

Her cell door clangs shut behind him, leaving her in total silence with the torch flaring in its holder. She stares after him as he disappears from her sight and scoffs. “Ill-mannered.”

“Stop,” she forcefully speaks next to the shadows going frantic in her cell. “ _Stop right now._ ”

It takes them more than a few orders to calm down, but they do eventually and rush around her, almost like a needy dog and fuss over her, already forming reports she can’t hear. She rubs her smarting head and winces to herself, mumbling “ow”.

Shivering, she wraps her arms around herself and tries to make herself as comfortable as she can in the corner of her bare cell. The pain in her head helps her go to sleep.

She wakes in what feels like five seconds to the same previous guards opening her cell and dragging her from it. Her pride bristles at the handling, preferring to be led as she was previously the day before, so she tugs her whole form back to put up a fight.

“Let me walk, I don’t want to ruin my dress, please.”

The two guards exchange looks with one another then seeming to come to an agreement, they let her get up from her knees to stand on her sandal-clad feet. She brushes down her skirts and thanks them, pushing her hair from her face. They lead her by her elbows as yesterday.

King Lucien sits in his throne this time, his spymaster at his side dutifully. There is a Princess this time, seated on a smaller throne by her –Elain is assuming- father. She is a little girl, barely twelve, Elain guesses, and her eyes are very keen and sharp.

Elain’s gaze falls onto the formidable look on the spymaster’s face, then she notices a warrior-built fae standing by a pillar, close to the throne, armed to the teeth with weapons and a forbidding aura about him. He holds a sheathed knife in his palms, turning it over and around lazily. The two guards push Elain to her knees at the foot of the King’s throne in what is unmistakably a kneel. She doesn’t attempt to stand up, her knees smarting from the blow.

“Greetings, Lady Elain. I assume your night was comfortable?”

She straightens, and looks up to meet his eyes as he gets to his feet. She remains silent, blinking mutely at him as she brushes her hair from her face. He fixes her with a studious gaze, his brows furrowed.

“This is Freida, my daughter,” he gestures to the princess. “She’s almost fifteen. We are planning on celebrating her birthday in a few months, I hope the festivities will be cheerful; we haven’t had a good reason to celebrate anything cheerfully in many years, Lady.”

Elain remains wordless.

“Have you given thought to my offer?”

“Yes,” Elain nods, her hands in her lap. “My answer has not changed.”

His face contorts into one of absolute fury and rage, he looks ready to cleave her head off her shoulder. She stares calmly back at him, unfazed.

“You will _not_ lend us your aid?”

“Yes.”

“Freida, you’re excused.”

The princess hurriedly takes her leave, escaping the throne room in a flurry of skirts and silk and long dark hair. When the doors slam shut behind her, the King backhands Elain into the floor.

This time, her lip splits and blood trickles from the open skin at the handling. He advances on her, eyes ablaze and face twisted into the face of an ugly monster. Elain, on the floor bracing herself against her hands behind her on the polished floor, does not blink.

“You will regret this,” he whispers. “You will. You will regret condemning my kingdom to doom. Condemning my daughter to a fate worse than death. You-“

“My liege,” begins the spymaster. “Perhaps the Seer requires more convincing.”

“Give me that,” snaps the King, holding a hand for the warrior fae to place the sheathed dagger in in. He obeys silently, hands his king the blade carefully. The King draws the blade and looks at her contemplatively. “Why?” he asks, his voice tight and barely restrained.

Her gaze darts to the shadows rioting, to some escaping and some raging. She purses her lips tightly and tries to call them back quietly but they either ignore her or don’t hear her.

“Why?” he snarls again.

She looks back at him, then at the blade in his hands. It’s moulded with ash wood, and could leave her to die if he so wishes. He flips it in his hands, noticing her slightly fearful look. “I will use this,” he promises quietly. “Why will you not help us?”

Then the shadows disappear altogether and she bites her bottom lip. “ _WHY?_ ”

“Your silence will not save you, Kingslayer,” warns the spymaster.

And then she hears it; a formidable thought rushing towards them; a hushed haunting presence spreading its fingers and grasp to consume their hearts. She hears him.

Elain smiles, something sinister and cold and so-not-her as she says; “No. But he will.”

Azriel appears in shadows a part of them, before anyone can realize he has appeared. One moment some place, the other here. She smiles more truthfully and joyful when his presence makes her heart jump and she gladly takes her gaze off the stunned King of Vallahan to her husband.

He stalks to the King in long strides serenaded by the sounds of his boots on the hardwood floor, a dark look settled over his face and his seven – _seven_ , goodness, there isn’t any need for that, she reckons- Siphons flaring brightly blue.

The spymaster and warrior fae drop motionless to the floor, shadows escaping their ears that cater to Elain who watches her husband reach the King of Vallahan –bravely wielding the knife in his hands, she has to give him that- and then strike him a massive painful blow with his clenched fist straight to his face that sends the monarch of the realm flying into the ground. While the King moans in pain, Azriel reaches her and kneels next to her.

Her heart softens at the look in his eyes as he takes in her face- a bruise undoubtedly on her blooded lips from last night and on her temple. “Are you all right?” he asks quietly, touching her elbow. She nods in answer and gives him an assuring smile. “I’m going to kill Rhysand,” he vows softly, touching her cheek with a cold finger.

“It’s all right,” she whispers. “I knew. I agreed.”

“I’m going to kill him,” he repeats, his hazel eyes clouded by rage and hurt- and betrayal. That strikes her heart more than anything. “Sending me off just to make sure his plan for you goes as he wants. I’m going to kill him.”

“Az,” she curls her hand around the back of his neck. “It’s okay. It needed to be done.”

“I’m going to kill him.”

It’s the cold whispering of his voice that makes it so terrifying- she would prefer furniture smashing and endless shouting to this. This steely promise, this unsettled anger running confused and promising to leave nothing but chaos in its wake is what makes Azriel’s words grimmer.

“Az,” her voice is tearful. “Look at me, honeycomb. I’m all right.”

He runs his hand through her hair, and his eyes latch onto a spot in her temple. His fingers come back with a smudge of blood on them. He straightens to his full height on his feet, hauls the King with his hands and raises him in the air.

“I am under strict orders from both my High Lord and Lady not to paint your walls,” Elain feels a cold shudder run through her, and goosebumps rise on her skin. Shadows retreat from around her, allowing sunshine to warm her. She doesn’t think it has anything to do with the temperature. “I am considering a lifetime in The Prison to do so. Just to cave your head in. Your spymaster will live; granted, he’ll be a few intelligent thoughts short but he’ll be a wiser man for it.”

“Azriel, please darling,” she scrambles to her feet and grabs his shoulder. “Rhys and Feyre-“

“Can damn themselves to Hell,” he replies.

She’s scared; for the first time since being told that other kingdoms are starting to go after her and that the necromancer was the start of an avalanche, she’s scared. And it breaks her heart to think she’s the reason for this; this unimaginable hurt Azriel’s portraying, she contributed in causing it. Suddenly she regrets agreeing to Rhys’s suggested plan, wishes Azriel had refused to let her go with it, wishes that he shoved them all out of their house the moment the idea was suggested and wishes that it never happens because she discovers, now, that losing the whole world could not nearly amount to seeing him like this and being the reason.

“ _Please,_ ” she whispers tearfully. “Azriel, please, darling. Put him down. Let him go. For me, Az,” and though it kills her to say it but then she adds; “For me, let it hurt but release him.” Hurt yourself for me, she feels her words are telling him and her tears spill from her eyes when he lowers the King and shoves him into his throne.

Azriel turns to her, holding out his hand. “Let’s go.”

“You have business here,” she reminds him quietly.

“Let’s go,” he insists.

“Az,” she says softly but firmly. “Everything happened for this. This is the point of it all.”

Emotions swirl in hazel eyes, a whirlpool of catastrophic thoughts stubbornly swirling together. She stares unflinchingly at him, touching his forearm gently. “Az. We promised.”

Her husband straightens, steeling his back and his wings flaring wide. He rounds onto the King with a broken nose on the throne and an unpleasant disgusted look washes over his handsome face.


	5. Your silence will not protect you PART 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (in which Azriel has had enough of feeling betrayed, and Elain fends off unwanted interactions and emotional turmoil for her husband-turned-hermit with pitchforks and a sunny behaviour)

After six hours of Azriel ruthlessly setting down rules and conditions, running over the King suffering a pounding headache with his demands and negotiations, the spymaster and warrior fae of Vallahan taken to the infirmary to be treated for concussions, and Elain examining the tablecloths, window art, curtains and carpets half-heartedly, they reach an agreement that is in the Night Court’s interest to cave the path of a treaty that will be constructed later by the court craftsmen of the court with Vallahan to begin official relations by diplomats.

Azriel stands suddenly when the King nods his consent quietly with a wince to the final conditions, and Elain jumps to her feet- eager to be back home, to the house Azriel had furnished for her lovingly with his own hands, to her garden and baths. The King, on his face a blooming massive flower of a bruise colouring his mouth, nose and cheeks, winces at the noise. She immediately takes Azriel’s hand with an unsettled feeling in her bones and feels that familiar sensation of following him through his shadow world.

A second later, she’s staring at the front of Rhys and Feyre’s townhouse, then Azriel’s back as he storms inside and she runs after him.

Her sisters, Rhysand –a very soon dead fae if Azriel’s cold temper is any indication-, Cassian, Mor and Amren are all in the large dining room and Elain tries to give them a head start on the situation by calling Azriel’s name but her sisters immediately leap at her, drowning her in kisses and tight embraces that drown her loud protests. Mor comes over and gives Elain a tight hug, none of them picking up that something terrible was going to happen- so, so awful.

“Az!” Rhys shoots to his feet the moment they appear in the room before the open dining room and she’s bombarded by females. Cassian and Rhys hurry towards them, maneuvering through pushed back chairs. “How’d it-“

He doesn’t get to finish his sentence because Azriel yanks him forward by the collar and slams his fist into Rhysand’s jaw who is too shocked to raise his hands even and Elain shrieks, shoving away her sisters and Mor.

“AZ!”

“Fuck!” Cassian swears as Azriel throws Rhys across the room, into the wall, furniture smashed and broken by the impact. “Fuck, fuck, fuck. Az, calm down, look at yourself-“

Cassian too is blasted into another wall by a shield of blue electric light, Azriel’s seven Siphons flaring bright –that’s what they’re for?- as he hauls Rhys up and slams him into the wall.

Feyre has gone absolutely frozen stiff beside Elain in shock, all their eyes are wide in shock as Azriel knees Rhys in the gut who doubles over and wheezes, feebly pushing back the shadowsinger.

“I deserve that-“ admits Rhys in a grunt to Azriel’s ashen face but the words are drowned out by shadows lunging at Rhys to tear him apart and Azriel wrapping his hands around Rhys’s throat. Cassian stands up, but he is quick to be pinned to the wall by Azriel’s blue film of light.

“Holy burning Hell below,” whispers Mor mortified. By everyone’s frozen state, no one has ever witnessed Azriel snap and they obviously have no idea what to do.

“Az?” Feyre stumbles away from Elain, shocked and stunned. “Azriel, what the fuck are you doing? LET HIM GO!” she screams when Az slams Rhys into the wall again; Nesta snatches her roughly by the shoulder and yanks her back several feet.

“He’s not himself,” she snaps to Feyre’s outraged face. “He’d kill every one of us if we step in. Cassian’s dumb enough to try that.”

“Amren do something!”

Their Second in Command looks hesitant to step between Rhys and Azriel. “Rhysand pull yourself together,” she finally commands without moving from her place in the corner of the room, so small in comparison to the beast Azriel is and Rhys’s figure.

“Az,” wheezes Rhys, shoving the shadowsinger roughly away as air is cut from his lungs. Azriel doesn’t budge and Rhys finally pulls his power to blast Azriel away, but he only manages to get him far enough about seven feet.

“Don’t call me that,” replies Azriel in a quiet murderous voice, his harsh soft voice the sharpest of knives. “Don’t ever call me that you bastard.”

“I’m sorry your wife was in harm’s way,” Rhys rasps, stepping back from Azriel’s towering build. “But you agreed to this. She did too.”

“It’s NOT about that!” roars Azriel so loudly it echoes and thunders through the house. A sob tears itself from Elain’s lips at the desolate hurt in his face, the tears in his furious eyes, the breaks in his voice that goes hoarse at the end. She shakes as Nesta wraps her tightly in her arms, as Mor stands halfway between the Archeron sisters and the males as if trying to figure out if she is protecting them from Azriel or the brawl. “It is not about that, and you-know-it,” his voice drops to a harsh hiss. A choked sound escapes Feyre’s lips at the raw pure emotion. “You know it deep in your bones,” Azriel goes on, silencing Rhys who stills against the wall, rubbing his throat. “And I want you to know, that I never want to see your face ever again in my whole life.”

Absolute stunned silence.

“Az, you’re just mad,” Cassian grunts as the blue shield fades around him. He steps forward towards Az who whirls to him.

“You too.”

“..What?”

“I don’t want to have anything to do with either of you. For the rest of my life,” tears spill from Azriel down his face as Cassian pales and blanches. “You cannot keep betraying my trust and expect me to forgive you every time.”

Azriel rips off the gauntlets on his arms letting them drop to the ground, then his Illyrian leather armour complete with the seven Siphons and throws it at Rhys’s feet amongst the ruin of the dining room furniture. 

“Az-“ Rhys begins pleading.

“Do not call me that,” a strangled sob wrestles it way out of Azriel’s lips who has had enough. “I never want to see you ever again.” He promptly makes to leave the dining room, when Mor steps in his way.

“Were you in on it too?” he asks in that betrayed voice, his hazel eyes are uncharacteristically bitter as he regards Mor with them.

“On what?” she whispers, though her face says it all.

“That I was sent on a wild goose chase so Elain could be snatched away by whoever wanted her.”

Mor doesn’t reply but Az’s face twists. “I can’t believe you,” he answers, pushing past Mor without paying her another glance. The golden-haired High Fae looks after him in complete astonishment, her face slack with worry and her eyes bright as her lips fall open. Immediately, Elain pushes Nesta off her and runs after him.

“Az,” she grabs his arm in the antechamber. “Let’s go home, sweetheart. Take us home.”

Her husband nods once as his face loses its composure and it breaks Elain’s heart in a way nothing, nothing, has ever before.

He takes them home.

_____

The next few hours are the worst Elain has lived –her time in the Cauldron included- if only because Azriel is every inch a kicked puppy as he is allowed.

He has been sitting in the balcony ever since they arrived, their cat Nala in his lap sensing his turmoil and offering comfort, and tears rolling steadily and silently down his cheeks. Elain keeps checking in on him every hour or so and he never moves an inch from his previous position. He breaks her heart, if only because his hurt is too great a wound for her to be able to navigate- this is old, festering in him for who knows how many centuries, and not completely related to her but the people he calls a family.

Night falls and he doesn’t budge from his place, still in his leather pants and black tunic, staring at the sky before him. She starts to worry for him when she talks to him and he doesn’t respond. She makes him tea from their garden –their pride and joy- and takes it to him. The smell of the herbal tea makes his throat bob and his eyes to soften with sadness.

She presses the mug in his hand and settles in his lap after chasing Nala away to the other lounge chair. “Drink it,” she advises softly, brushing his ruffled dark hair. “You’ll feel better.”

He takes a drink, then hands it back to her. She puts it down, then cups his cheeks gently, as he fights not to look at her or meet her gaze, his face slipping from being composed to crumbling into sadness.

“You don’t have to hide from me,” she whispers against his brow and his answer is shaking and a sob escaping his lips as tears begin to spill yet again. She lets them fall, lets that ache settle in his chest and for his sadness to express itself. He is hurt and he has to express it, if there’s one thing she has learned in her life- that is it.

“I’m nothing now,” he whispers wetly after a long silence. “Not an Illyrian, not a spymaster, not a son, not a brother, not a friend. I’m nothing.”

She fights her own tears but holds them back.

“Sorry, Elain. I’m sorry you’re married to someone like me.”

“Don’t think that,” she murmurs. “Ever. I never regretted wanting you. I never will. You’re so much more than what you think; you’re the most powerful of your race-“

“My race,” he scoffs thickly, his eyes filling with more tears as she accidentally rubbed salt in his wounds. “My race locked me in a cell for eight years. My kin tortured me for fun. My race kicked me and hunted me down every chance they got. Power is nothing when there’s nothing to do with it. If I’m just my power or my looks, then I’m a sorry existence.

“I’ve tried to fight this for centuries, this truth, but I can’t anymore. I can’t be strong for you anymore, I’m sorry, I can’t be the person you fell in love with. I’m tired… just so tired of existing.”

“I never thought of you as powerful when I met you,” Elain makes him look into her eyes as she rages war with herself to keep her own emotions in check and not bawl her own eyes out. She blinks several times sharply. “I always thought you were the kindest soul I’ve ever met. I get asked why I love you, a lot of times, or why I chose you when we’re so different; you’re kind, Az, you’re just so kind that nothing in the world could make up for it. You’re strong and powerful, and men flee when they see you coming but I’ve never thought of that about you. In a time I missed my humanity the most, you were the only thing I could call home.”

Her husband looks away, sniffling, with his eyebrows twitching and the muscles of his face jolting slightly.

“You can be tired, and exhausted, and fed up,” Mor told Feyre that once, Elain remembers hearing it. She hopes it will offer Azriel the comfort and confidence it gave her. “And it’s all okay to put your head down and rest for a couple of days. It’s okay to take a break, from everything or anything. But it’s not okay to give up, because you’re many things, Az, but one thing you are not is a quitter.” 

He inhales shakily and rubs his red-rimmed eyes with his scarred hand. He looks at it, and his face starts to crumble with fresh waves of emotions.

“I’ll leave you to rest,” Elain kisses his forehead and gets up, abandoning his lap. She picks up Nala and sets her in Az’s lap. “I’m just a call away. Say my name if you need anything. I love you.”

He sighs and nods tiredly. She watches his head rest against the back of the chair and his eyes sliding shut before she ventures into their room and wrecks her mind for anything to make him feel better.

First, she lets her tears fall and her chest shudder.

__________

By the next morning, there’s a gentle knock on their front door. Elain rushes from the kitchen to answer it and is not surprised when Rhys stands at their doorstep looking like he hasn’t slept a wink. Elain’s eyes dart to the markings around his neck that he seems to have forgotten about.

His violet eyes ask the silent question and she feels so sorry for him then.

She shakes her head, refusing to open the door wide and let him in. “He’s… He needs time. He’s incredibly sad and he needs to rest. I’m sorry, I can’t let you in.”

Rhys doesn’t look surprised but his face takes a more miserable tone.

“How-How is Cassian?” she asks delicately.

“Shattered,” Rhys’s voice is rough and hoarse. “Looked like he was going to have a meltdown of his own before he left last night after you.”

“Have you seen him?” 

Rhys shakes his head.

“Come back later, Rhys,” she tells the High Lord. “I don’t know if he’ll feel better by then but he’s in no shape to see you now.”

Rhys nods and gives a pathetic attempt at a goodbye wave before he disappears. Elain massages her chest as a heavy weight settles in and the ache makes itself known. She closes the door and goes back to making Azriel’s favourite breakfast.

_________

Feyre shows up two days later, face lined with concern and worry. “Rhys just told me,” she says breathlessly the moment Elain opens the door, her clothes have some paint smudges- no doubt just out of her class. “How is he?” she makes to step in but Elain glances behind her in the house, biting her lip and steps out, bringing the door shut gently. Feyre’s face sharpens at the unwelcome.

“He’s not mad at you,” Elain says softly. “But he isn’t all right, yet.”

“I need to see him.”

Not with that sharp attitude, Elain thinks. “I’m sorry, Feyre. I can’t let you.”

“He’s my friend, Elain,” Feyre retorts hotly. “He’s not supposed to be left alone now. I’d know.”

“He’s not alone,” Elain responds patiently. “I’m taking care of him. But if you go see him it’d force him to make decisions and come to conclusions too early. Do you understand?” she winces slightly. “I don’t want him to ruin his relationships. He’s not in the right mindset. He needs time, Feyre, and he needs space. I-I-“ she stumbles over her words, wondering how to say what is on her mind without offending her sister. “-You’re all so understanding now that he needs peace, this is part of it. Just give him a break because I don’t want him to have interactions he doesn’t want. Okay, Feyre?”

Her sister’s face doesn’t look placated at all and she looks like she is about to shove Elain aside to talk to Azriel. Feyre doesn’t seem to understand that Elain’s husband is in no spirit to talk.

“I mean, he goes hours without saying anything to me. He talks when he wants, like always. But he’s preferring to be alone now. Can you- do you understand?”

Feyre’s face is bitter but she nods.

“Hold on,” Elain says when her sister makes to winnow away. “Rhys just told you?”

A cold expression washes over Feyre’s face. “He was getting the cold shoulder since you arrived.”

The words are a blow to Elain’s stomach and she forces herself to nod, not in the position to lecture her sister on her role as a wife and companion. The last thing Rhys would need is Feyre’s hostility and she shudders to think what it put Rhys through. The thought makes her so sorry for him.

“Wait a moment,” without another word, Elain runs into the house and the cool kitchen, where she takes the freshly baked muffins and cookies (also Azriel’s favourite; she’s been running herself thin thinking of all his favourite things and doing them, just to see that precious smile set back in its rightful place) and places them into a basket. Feyre cocks an eyebrow at it when Elain comes back and gives it to her. “They’re for Rhys,” she clarifies. “You’re welcome to one if he lets you,” she says with a teasing smile. Feyre’s smile is tight and doesn’t reach her eyes.

“Fey,” Elain puts a hand on her arm. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to offend you. I just think it’s best for Az, and he’s my priority now, okay?”

Feyre’s next smile is warmer and more understanding. “I know,” she squeezes Elain’s hand. “I’m sorry to disturb you. Please make him smile.”

Elain thinks to the precious smile that bloomed on his lips as she read him a paragraph from her current book and she nods. “I will.”

_________

Azriel doesn’t go through an emotional slump- not completely. He just avoids anything that breathes and has a conscious that isn’t Elain, Nala, their plants or the puppy Elain joyfully discovers in their garden. Though his solitary vigils are often and she frequently finds him with a miserable look on his face, he still thanks her with a smile at everything she does for him. He’s still her Azriel, just miserable.

They spend their days in the garden, him resting and sunning his wings while she gardens in the sunlight. It’s a habit of hers to look at him over her plants and flowers to see him reclining in the outdoor chairs, long legs stretched out before him, his wings fanned out, his eyes closed and his fingers scratching the golden coat of the puppy in his lap while Nala rested at the junction of his two foot crossed at the ankles- the three of them slumbering lazily in the warm sunlight. She’s happy that he’s enjoying sitting in the garden doing nothing (usually he’s reading countless reports and writing out chains of thoughts and orders) except resting.

He helps out in the house, his muscles extremely useful for a project Elain sometimes has in mind that requires heavy lifting and moving. She ventures one day into the city of Velaris and purchases a collection of card games, board games, puzzles and trivia questions they entertain themselves with. Elain keeps getting beaten at card games where –according to him- her poker face is anything but a poker face while he presents an immaculate front that she sometimes cracks open with –admittedly- some cheating and cheap tricks.

She can tell Azriel loves them, though, because he laughed the first time against her lips when she did, and his eyes darkened wickedly when she crawled into his lap giggling as part of her trick, kissing him until she felt herself go dizzy and he abandoned his cards altogether, roughly shoving aside the board game they were playing with his legs and forgot the game completely.

One night, they’re both getting ready for bed early (Elain decided that rising early and getting enough sleep would do wonders to his health after consulting a healer who recommended it) and he’s changing into his night clothes she recently purchased and began convincing him into wearing them (again, none of that I’ll-sleep-shirtless-and-in-any-pants-I’ve-found nonsense. Another healer advised that having a fixed routine that tells the mind it’s time to relax and shut down is an important thing to have daily. Hence their new hour-long routine) when they hear a knock on the door. Elain perks up, setting down her hairbrush just as Azriel freezes mid-buttoning his shirt. He meets her eyes in the mirror with boyish panic.

“At least talk to them,” she offers. “It’s been three weeks, Az.”

The knock sounds again gently.

“You parted harshly,” Elain says frankly. “If you want to sever ties, at least let it be on good terms.”

Azriel swallows and pats down his hair. She smiles encouragingly at him and slips on her night robe. Azriel departs from the bedroom while she ties her robe and follows him outside. She stays on the stairs when he opens the front door to Rhys standing at the front porch.

Elain has never seen her brother-in-law look so worse for wear. He looks like he hasn’t smiled since that day, and he seems like he is ready to crack and get on his knees for Azriel.

Azriel stares quietly at him before saying simply; “Hello.”

Rhys visibly swallows. “Hi.”

Azriel opens the door a bit wider but doesn’t step aside. He shifts on his socked feet. Carla runs down from the living space towards them and weaves herself between Azriel’s feet and regards Rhys before she gives a welcoming bark.

“Who’s this?” Rhys attempts a smile. Carla barks again, walks a figure-eight between Az’s legs and looks up at Azriel for approval. He reaches down and scratches her head.

“Carla. Elain found her in the garden.”

“She’s adorable.”

“Yes.”

Elain starts debating on whether or not it would be appropriate to intrude and save them both the situation but Azriel doesn’t seem uncomfortable as Rhys is and –she reminds herself- it’s his call.

“Want to come in?” Azriel finally says after a painfully long silence that stretched possibly ten seconds but felt like ages.

“If it’s no trouble.”

Azriel steps aside, holds the door wider for Rhys and closes it behind him. Rhys sees her standing at the stairs and smiles at her. “Nice to see you, Elain. Thank you for the cookies.”

“You’re welcome,” she replies courteously and motions for Carla to come to her. The good girl eagerly runs over to her mistress and licks her hand. “Living space is airy,” she suggests with a timid smile. “Do you need anything?”

Azriel smiles warmly at her. “It’s all right, love. You go to bed, I’ll be up in a moment.”

She doesn’t read into that too much as Rhys is seemingly doing before she bids him goodnight and ushers Carla up with her. Nala is already sound asleep in her basket in their pets’s room (when she suggested they make it, Azriel was stunned silent for a whole minute before he shrugged and agreed) and Elain watches Carla run to her own basket to settle down in.

“Good girl,” she praises softly and leaves the room for her own. She doesn’t intend on listening in to their conversation, but their voices carry up anyway in the house silent as a church mouse. While she gets into their bed, her ears pick up pieces of their conversation.

“I’m beyond sorry at this point, Azriel. I don’t have any words to say but to beg your forgiveness. Please, I can’t live in my own skin knowing how much you’re hurt. I’m begging you. Please, I’m so sorry.”

There’s no response from Azriel.

“If I can go back in time, I’d never deceive you that day. I’d throw myself at an ash blade before I let it happen again. I- I despise myself for hurting you this bad.”

“It’s not just that day. You make it a habit to lie to me, then you get sorry and ask my forgiveness and then you do it all again. I’m tired of your bullshit. I’m exhausted. I don’t want your apologies, I don’t want any of your nonsense. I’ve got a life, and I’m not letting it center around your every breath and everyone else.”

“If I promise not to let any of that happen again?”

“Then I won’t believe you.”

Heartbreaking silence follows Azriel’s simple words.

“How can I make you believe?”

“Why are you here? Beyond your shit apologizing, why are you here, now of all times?”

“Because I can’t stand this between us. And I want my friend back, I want my brother back. The one who’s looked after me as far as I can remember. I want the male who’s never let me down when I continuously do and I want to make it right again. I’ll do whatever it takes.”

“I’m not your friend if you keep lying to me. You used my unwavering trust in you, and behind my back you went on with your brilliant plan. If I’d known- if you’d bothered to tell me I would have kept more shadows on her, to help her. Lucius wouldn’t have touched her. And for what, Rhysand? Were you worried I’d put my foot down at leaving her unshielded? Did you know it was stupid? Is that why you lied? Because you knew you’d never do that to Feyre but you did anyway to Elain?”

“I’m sorry. You’re right. I-I was insensitive-“

“You don’t get it,” snaps Azriel. “You’re half the time insensitive. At least with me.”

“Then tell me. That’s how I’m supposed to know you’re bothered- let me know I’m pissing you off. Put your fucking foot down and demand I get off my high-fucking-horse, Azriel.”

“That’s what I do. That’s my job in this damned troop of ours. Be everyone’s conscious, listen to everyone, keep everyone in check. I’m exhausted of that, Rhysand, I’m exhausted. I don’t want to waste my energy on everyone acting like a damn child. I don’t want to be considerate and understanding all the time, I want to be selfish for one damn time.”

“All right,” Rhys’s voice is tight. “What do you want now? Out of all this? Your outburst the other day, storming off after you said you didn’t want anything to do with us, what was its purpose? What do you want now so I can fix things?”

“I wanted you to hurt, the way I did,” responds Azriel softly. “I wanted you to know how fed up I am. How chocked and suffocated I get until I-I can’t breathe..”

Elain’s eyes water as she hears his voice do just that.

“I want you all to look after me like I do you,” he says simply, with a heartbroken tone. “I don’t want to feel like I’m giving and giving and giving and getting nothing back, Rhys. I’m tired of being… scared and insecure that I don’t have a place with you all like you do with each other. I know it’s selfish, but that is what I want.”

“Az, I never knew you felt like that.”

“That’s my point. That you never ask-“

“We do. I do. A lot of times. I make it a point to ask but you don’t know how to answer. I ask you nearly every time I give you a job if you’re all right doing it, and you don’t tell me all this, Azriel. Please, I need you to tell me. As for me being a spineless asshole, I can only apologize and promise you I’m working on it. I swear, I will. I’ll swear an oath to you to be truthful and completely honest with you and that I’ll never smear my bullshit in your way, and if I break your trust ever again I’ll personally relieve you of the burden of being associated with me. Let me get your trust back.”

“I’m tired, Rhys. I can’t-“

“I’m not talking about spymaster. Just you, my brother. I want to make it up for you, and I want you as my friend again before any job.”

She hears Azriel exhale softly.

“I’ll think on it. I’m not saying no, but I need time to trust you blindly again.”

“I’ll settle for the smallest crumb of trust from you. It means the world to me, and I haven’t realized until now how precious you are to me. I’m genuinely sorry about that and everything else.”

Silence then;

“I know.”

Rhys’s exhale of relief sounds like the current of wind blowing through the house. “I miss you, Az. We all do. Feyre’s dying to see you again, and Amren keeps asking about you. When do you think I can come by again to see you?”

“Whenever.”

“Cauldron I’ve never been relieved to hear anything. Can I give you a hug, Az-?”

“Don’t push it.”

Rhys laughs shakily. “Of course. Whatever you want. Just remember, you mean the world to me and I can’t think of losing you.”

“I love you too, Rhys.”

“Night, Az.”

“Goodnight.”

_______________

The warm spring rays beat down against her neck as she plants a couple of peonies, happily humming to herself as she digs her fingers in the soil and tends gently to the plants. Jolted by the sudden cool absence of the warmth, she looks up to see Azriel standing close by, arms crossed casually and his shadows encompassing him. She smiles and brushes back sweat on her forehead with the back of her hand as she stands up. Azriel immediately rubs away a spot of smeared dirt on her forehead gently before flicking her nose, earning a giggle.

“Do you want anything?” he asks her, and she takes notice of his clothes. “I’m going out.”

Trousers, a pale blue shirt tucked in and an ink-blue coat over. She looks up at his face, a smile stretching her lips that is seldom absent when he’s around.

“Where are you off to, may I ask?” she asks. He hasn’t left the vicinity since holing himself up in the house, with the exception of shadow-sponsored trips to nameless locations (she thought about asking once, but decided against it when he comes back a few hours later with an improved mood and clearer head- that’s all she needs to know, really) so she’s delighted he is leaving the house of his own volition.

“Velaris,” he answers smoothly. She feels eternally proud of the clear look in his eyes- the collected male she met looks even at more peace. “I want to find Cass.”

“That’s good,” she brushes her soiled hands against her gardening dress’s skirt.

“I want to apologise,” he says, searching her face for a reaction. “I shouldn’t have said what I did. I regret it. He’s not obliged to have me exploding on him.”

“You were upset,” Elain assures fairly. “If I know Cassian I think he’s beating himself up not because of your words but the hurt he caused you. He’ll understand when you talk to him. I think he’ll definitely forgive you.”

Azriel nods and touches her cheek briefly. “Do you want anything?”

“Invite him back,” she suggests happily. “He’ll love it- oh, let’s have them all for dinner tonight! I think I mastered the casserole enough. It’ll be the perfect reunion. What do you think?”

“Sure,” he nods once and her smile widens into a full beam.

She cheerfully claps her hands together and hops on her two feet. “In that case take me with you. I’ll need to fetch things from the Palaces. We’ve never had them over, this will be exciting- oh, Az,” she says with a sudden dreadful tone. “We need to get more wine. The few we have won’t ever be enough.”

He laughs and kisses her cheek. “Go get dressed. You have five minutes.”

“To do what, pull out my outfit?” but she’s already bolting across the garden to the fence, his laugh echoing at her back.

In the end, Az finds Cassian while she ventures in the Palaces to grab her ingredients and needed necessities for hosting anyone of that importance (she picks up four bottles of fine wine –she has no idea how to differ and so has to employ the help of the shopkeeper- and some sparkling drink that she’s assured tastes heavenly) and she happens on the two of them on the bridge of the Rainbow.

She’s both shocked and pleasantly surprised at the embrace they’re sharing and Cassian’s endless sobbing and tears. According to Az, Cassian spent a good ten minutes weeping when Azriel asked for his forgiveness and then he grabbed him in a hug and refused to let go. Elain was on the receiving end of a hug from the strange Commander when Az pried him off him, and Cassian kept thanking her for taking care of Azriel better than anyone had before.

Their house that night was loudly alive in rambunctious and lively spirits. Rhys, Az, and Cassian drank themselves under the table (Elain realised she definitely should have gotten more than four bottles when almost everyone took a bottle for themselves) and sang all through the night like they were celebrating a victory at a battle, even going so far as dancing some Illyrian war dance that made the floorboards rumble and the walls to shake.

Feyre passed out of exhaustion around midnight at the couch from her classes and a tipsy Nesta seized the chance to draw all over her face in black ink whilst Mor dissolved into giggles like a schoolgirl by the fireplace (Elain wasn’t sure what was in the sparkling drink. It had to be strong enough to turn Mor’s miserable mood she’d worn like a second skin when she showed up into this version of her. Elain was honestly impressed but slightly concerned).

Elain drew the line just as Rhys pushed Nesta away from his mate and began crying like a baby at how beautiful his mate was and began declaring his love for her in a way a professional actor in the theatres would be set to shame. She had never seen him like this and wondered if this was a regular occurrence.

“You’re sick!” Cassian grabbed Rhys by the nape and dragged him away from hugging his passed out mate. “It’s disgusting. Get a whole other continent. Someone send him away- Azzy send him away, please. I am actually begging you-“ Rhys would not be deterred and reached for his wife clumsily as he hung from Cassian’s grip like a cat held by the neck. “-someone cure him! This is unacceptable. Azzy please-“

Elain was dumbfounded when her husband, slouched in the armchair vertically, his long legs hung off the edge and his torso along with his limbs off the other, dissolved into a fit of hoarse hysterical laughter and tipped his head back. She eyed the empty bottle of the sparkling drink in his lap warily.

Everyone stayed the night, slept in heaps over each other on the floor, a whole mess of tangled limbs and bodies that she didn’t bother navigating. It was useless to try and sort them out in this state, even if she had Azriel’s help –which she didn’t- but the look on her husband’s face as he slept, sandwiched like packed fish at the docks between his brothers, made her relieved beyond description. She went to her own bed laughing at the expression that took over his passed out face when Cassian’s socked foot was stuck in his face and he’d batted him away to bury himself under Rhys’s torso.

Like she said; a mess.

It was a point of pride for her, that she was the last one left standing of them all and was the first to wake up. Were it not for her consideration that made her spread out blankets over bodies –whomever they belonged to- she would have woke them all up by beating a pan with the hammer Cassian brandished last night out of nowhere (she hoped it wasn’t a new hobby of his). Waking up with pounding headaches and unforgiving stomachs was punishment enough, but she let them be.

Her husband woke up the first and hugged her from behind as she fixed breakfast and she was sure he dozed off as he leaned against her. It felt like navigating the space with a bear clinging to her back but –she caught herself happily thinking- she wouldn’t change it for the world.


	6. I may have accidentally, sort of, adopted five cats.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (in which Elain has a soft spot for furry little kittens and Azriel tries to remember how ‘No’ is pronounced)

“Sir, you have a visitor.”

Azriel looks up from his computer screen at Nuala standing in his doorway with a faint smile on her lips. His brow furrows in puzzlement as his eyes adjust to the brightness difference so she adds; “Your wife.”

“Oh,” his face smooths out and his lips smile as he wonders what could have brought Elain here. “Send her in, Nuala. What are you asking for?”

Nuala hesitates at the doorway, hand on the door handle and her smile twitches in amusement. “She asks you not to panic and to remain calm.”

He pushes his office chair back and stands, now definitely confused and worried. “Just send her in, Nuala.” As if he’d ever lose his cool with Elain in the vicinity; he’s never said a bad word in front of her or raised his voice a pitch higher than his normal tone and it is surely saying something considering Cassian tests the patience of a saint.

Nuala grins and backs out, a moment later Elain strides gently into his office with a basket hung off her arm. She looks normal, nothing to fret about, so he grins at her and bestows a kiss on her cheek.

“Hey, muffin,” she smiles up at him charmingly. “How’re you?”

“Fine,” he hooks an arm around her slender waist, and leads her to his office chair where she sits and he perches on the edge of his desk. “What’s the reason behind this delightful surprise?”

“Oh I was in the area so I thought I’d check up on you.”

He glances at his wristwatch; ten minutes to nine o’clock. “I was just finishing up,” he reaches over to his computer screen and switches it off. He has a couple of reports to read according to his day’s plan but it can wait or be pushed to tomorrow for his Elain- he’s always more than willing to put aside his work for her. “What were you doing here?”

“I was helping out in a few shelters,” she answers, crossing her feet at the ankles and settling the basket in her lap.

“What’s with the basket, then?” he wishes it’s full of Elain’s baked pastries but wouldn’t bet on it; today doesn’t look like it was baking day for Elain.

“Oh, um, that,” his wife chuckles nervously, brushing her hair behind her ears. “I-uh…”

She looks nervous and uncomfortable so he takes her hand and smiles assuring. “You can tell me anything.”

“Please don’t be mad,” she mumbles. “I was at an animal shelter when this little kitten caught my eye. He was so sad and looked lonesome there in his cage that I just had to give him a comforting cuddle but then, well, he wouldn’t leave my arms and then I… sort of grew attached.”

Azriel thinks he knows where this is going and can’t resist the loving smile on his lips. “Okay. I am going on a hunch and assume we’re going to need a litter and cat food.”

“Yes, a few.”

He thinks he misheard her or she misspoke.

“Can I be introduced?” he asks, glancing at the basket undoubtedly housing the little fellow. Elain bites her lower lip and gives him that look. The one she uses when she wants something from him and uses it because she knows he can’t resist it no matter what. He knows he’s in deep shit when he sees it on her beautiful face and feels his composure resolving.

“Okay so I was going to leave the shelter with this guy, right? But then I see this other kitten too, looking so adorably at me that I thought I’d just give her a brush, right? She wanted to play all day and I couldn’t just leave her there, not when the workers told me they were going to be put down next day. She’s so cute and I-“

“Ellie,” Azriel says patiently. “I get it. You got them both. I don’t mind.”

“Well,” she says slowly and he blinks in shock. Well? Were there more? “Um, she has this twin brother with her and he looked so heartbroken she was going alone and I… I mean, would you like to be separated from your sibling? I couldn’t bear the thought if I were in his place and I-“

“You do realize we have two dogs back home, a turtle, five fish, and a pair of birds?”

Elain blushes deep to her roots and looks away from him. “They are so cute, I couldn’t just… leave them to die, Az,” she says quietly, seriously. “We can give them a better home, and I want to. I want to make everything’s life better so…”

He leans over and kisses her head. “It’s okay. I know. I know. We’ll get three litters on the way home.”

“About that…”

He blinks down at his wife, thinking for a second why she would be so nervous about this; she knows he would grant her anything so a kitten or two (all right, three was stretching it) wouldn’t be a problem. Why is she nervous? Then he is struck with a dumb thought that he doesn’t want to believe.

“Elain,” he says slowly, glancing at the large basket. “Just how many cats did you leave the shelter with?”

Elain looks nervous as she lifts the lid of the basket revealing one giant chunk of cats curled inside together. Az leans forward for a better look; they’re all barely newborns and he tries to count them.

“I may have accidentally, sort of, adopted five cats,” speaks Elain softly, looking at him carefully for any sign.

“Five?” he whispers in disbelief. Five, Jesus, are they planning on opening a zoo without him knowing?

“Please don’t be mad,” she pleads. “I know I should have told you and we should have talked about this but they were going to be put down and I couldn’t bear the thought of a whole family of kittens dying because no one would take care of them. They’re one big family, Az, they remind me of yours- look, there’s one that reminded me of Rhys and one Amren.”

Azriel stares down at his new kitten children. Five. He knows he’s helpless against Elain’s wants, but this- this is too much, and wrong to the little ones.

“I thought if we’re ever reborn as animals, I’d want someone to adopt and take care of your family and you so there isn’t any reason not to take them in.”

Some meow at Azriel, most of them sleeping happily knowing they’re safe for the rest of their lives in Elain’s care. One of the five looks up at him and he strokes its small head before retracting his hand. This won’t do- he’ll have to be rational even if he wants to scoop all five of them in a hug. “Five, though, Elain? We won’t be able to give them the attention they need.”

“Yeah we would,” Elain eagerly says, clearly having thought this through. “I made approximate calculations and we’d only need to cut back on a few things to afford taking care of them. We’re already doing a good job with the others, why not give these guys a good home?”

“Space would be cramped.”

“Azriel, we have a whole room dedicated to our pets,” she dead-pans.

“What about kids, Elain?” he asks softly. “We can’t have a child with all these pets around.”

Elain looks abashed as she looks down at the kittens in her lap. “I just…”

“I’m not criticizing your feelings or your wishes,” he cups her cheek and raises her head to look him in the eyes. “I understand, love. I really do, but we just can’t. No one can do everything at once. And we’ve agreed on having children, but with an army of pets around? We wouldn’t give either the attention they deserve. You’re already off the pill; we’ve made that decision. We can’t have more pets, a pair of dogs is enough.”

“But I…” she truly looks crestfallen. “I just want to adopt all the pets in the world.”

He smiles. “I know. I get it. I love that about you.”

“I’ve already taken them in,” she whispers, looking down at the kittens like they’re her own children and can’t picture parting with them.

“We can take one or two,” he promises, earning an eager look in her eyes. “I don’t know if we can squeeze in a third. But we have to let some go.”

Elain swallows difficultly and nods. “How will we choose?”

“I’ll ask the boys,” he replies. “Rhys was talking the other day about a friend for Maria. Cassian would probably like one, if he’s willing to be responsible enough. Hopefully neither of your sisters would mind; the boys are secretly soft for little animals. Mor would definitely want a cat for a daughter so I can guarantee a home for one already.”

“In the mean time?” she asks eagerly.

“Well, in the meantime,” he leans back on his desk and stretches out his legs before him. “I guess we need a ton of cat food. Which reminds me we need food for the fish and dogs.”

“And for us,” she adds with a smile. He stands up and takes her hand as she too gets to her feet, then sweeps his phone and keys off the desk, flicking off the desk lamp and grabbing his jacket.

“I was going to take you out for dinner, but seeing as we have a small troop of pets to look after, I think we’ll have to settle for takeout. What do you think?”

“I’ll settle for anything,” she wraps her free arm around his own. “As long as you’re with me.”

He kisses the top of her head with an impossibly in-love smile.

“I love you, my cute burrito. And our small army of pets.”

“I love you too, my muffin.”


	7. "It's three in the morning." "I know, but I missed you."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anonymous asked: 21 for Elriel please  
> (“It’s three in the morning.”  
> “I know, but I missed you.”)

The Hot Pie then opens its mouth to speak, but instead of the reprimand surely to come from its carved mouth for The Kettle’s recklessness, a buzzing escapes its lips. The Kettle besides her whistles in confusion as the vibrating noise leaves the Hot Pie’s crusty lips, and she turns to it for elaboration before The Kettle’s whistling voice transforms into the same buzzing from Hot Pie. She frowns, then the sounds resonates in her ear coming from everywhere; the red sky above her head, and black earth beneath her feet, the dragon’s slumbering snoring becomes of the same buzzing. It grows louder and louder and more disturbing until her eyes fly open and she’s staring at her dark ceiling.

A buzzing sound by her head, Elain looks towards her bedside and finds her cellphone vibrating. She groans a muffled sound in her head, twisting and reaching blindly to shut up the surely alarm when her mind registers that this is unusual and she hasn’t set any alarms.

Sitting up, she grabs it and her bleary eyes focus on the bright screen. The sudden attack of light delays her understanding of what the screen displays and it takes her some blind fumbling with the device to bring its brightness down until she reads it.

_Az Muffin ❤️_

_mobile_

_Remind me Message_

_Decline Accept_

She blinks at the screen for a moment before pressing the green button and placing the phone to her ear. “Hello?” her voice is hoarse, and her still delirious mind slightly worried. “Az?”

“Hey, love,” the sound of her cheerful fiancé resonates loudly through the speakers, his tone awake and alert, unlike her sleep-addled one. “Quick question; lavender or pomegranate and aloe vera?”

“What?” she croaks, glancing at the clock on her bedside. 3am.

“Yeah, pomegranate and aloe vera feel more special. You got lavender but not this.”

“Az what’s…?”

“Rhys wanted to shop for something to get Feyre,” Azriel replies, the loud life of a shopping center accompanying his voice through the speaker. “So here we are in a beauty shop. I saw this collection of hand creams and face masks and I thought you’d like them. I’ve never been more at loss with all these options but after an hour I’ve narrowed them down a bit.”

She pushes her hair from her face. “What?” she repeats faintly.

“By the way, you did mention you wanted a kimono, right?”

“Az, what’s… It’s three in the morning.”

He sounds slightly sheepish. “Sorry. I know, but I missed you.”

She scoots backwards on the back, bringing her knees to her chest and putting the phone on speaker upon them. “I miss you too. How’s your trip?”

“Fun,” he answers noncommittally. “It’s nice to be back with them and have fun. But I don’t think I can take more of Rhys’s lovesickness. There isn’t a conversation we have that he doesn’t manage to direct it back to Feyre.”

She laughs faintly. “You’re no better,” she rubs her eyes. “Talking to me this late when you’re with them.”

“Cass and Rhys have been having a debate about which smell would be nicest for the past hour while I’ve been trying to get some actual shopping done,” Elain can almost see him in the shop, hidden behind stalls and displayed products he’s going through while talking to her, trying to find a winner while his brothers argue amongst themselves somewhere else where he can claim no relations to them. “Cass is going for jasmine while Rhys is fully supporting roses.”

“Save their asses right now and tell them my sisters despise those scents,” she replies immediately. “Nesta would sooner smash it over Cassian’s head than wear anything close to jasmine and Feyre hates roses.”

“Noted. Any recommendations?”

“Tell them to avoid flower smelling perfumes,” she gathers her hair in a bunch and yawns, releasing it. “I’m the only one who likes them.”

“Lucky me. Got anything in mind?”

“Something new,” she yawns again. “It doesn’t have to be flowery. What did you do today?”

“Aside from sightseeing, pushing each other off bridges, an impromptu snowball fight, and shopping in obscenely expensive places thanks to Rhys’s fat wallet and privileged upbringing, nothing really. How do you feel about avocado face masks?”

“No,” she hums.

“Thought so. Anyway, I’m done. Nothing here for you, really. Hold on a sec- Cass, Rhys! Elain advises you to avoid flower perfumes if you don’t want to be single on Christmas. So how was your day?”

“Calm,” she recalls the peaceful day at the bakery. “Customers today were really polite and lovely.”

“That’s probably because of Geralt’s massive presence,” he snorts.

She smiles at the thought of the dog sleeping at the foot of her bed. He’s snoring soundly at her feet and hugging his cactus toy. “Did you get him anything?”

“I’m spoiling him rotten. It’s unbelievable.”

“Well he does love you.”

“An honour. Wait for a second, I’m going to pay.”

Elain reaches for her fluffy robe on the other side of the bed and pulls it on as she gets to her feet, yawning again. She doesn’t suppose she’ll be going back to sleep now, so she might as well prepare for her day.

Just as she is making her coffee, Azriel’s voice comes back on the speakers. “So I’m thinking of ditching them in the shop and making a run for it back to the hotel.”

“Don’t be silly,” she smiles and pours the hot drink into her pastel green coffee mug that has _‘talk to the fluff’_ and the back of a corgi printed on it. She has a hobby of collecting mugs that have clever prints on them and Azriel promised to put in his wedding vows never to judge her for them and to endorse her addiction of them. So far, he has bought her three, one of which has the print of a cat and printed over it _‘not a morning purrson’_ which is ironically funny when she is exactly the opposite and they have a dog instead of a cat. Nesta bought her one which also has the drawing of a cat wearing sunglasses and flipping off whoever reading it saying _‘fluff you, you fluffin’ fluff!’._

“Our original plan entailed going out for drinks and food tonight. I don’t know if they’re still up to it.”

She takes a sip of the nectar of the gods and sighs in relief. She would much rather have Azriel prepare the necessary drink but with him on a trip in Japan with Cassian and Rhys, she has to settle for her own which tastes poorly in comparison to his. “Oh, send me your pictures when you get back to the hotel!”

“Promise.”

“Now, you go out with those two train wrecks and have fun, okay?”

“Not too much fun, though?” his voice practically smiles.

“Have _all_ the fun in the world. You deserve it.”

“I don’t think I deserve you, Elain Archeron.”

She grins abashedly at her coffee. “Soon to be Leinshaft, if you have forgotten.”

“Still up for that? My family name sucks. I’m still down to changing mine to yours.”

“I know,” she smiles brightly. “But I’d rather have your name.”

“Well, Elain Archeron-Leinshaft, it’s an honour to have you grace that name.”

“The honour is all mine, muffin. Now go have fun, and send me all your pictures.”

“I love you.”

“Love you too.”


	8. Please put me down, it’s just a sprained ankle.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (in which Az is away, Elain might be a little homesick for him and Cassian is a fussing figure)

Pain cramps the muscles in her lower foot unmercifully and her whole body involuntarily spasms to contain it. Elain bites down on her lips tightly as another wave of pain rolls through her lower foot, forcing her to tighten her arms around the neck of the male carrying her.

She clenches her teeth tightly and refuses to move her lips until she’s certain it won’t be a whimper of pain escaping them. When the tide loosens to a bearable twinge, she parts her lips to speak to Cassian carrying her.

“Please put me down,” she requests, wholly uncomfortable with him carrying her in the streets of Velaris in broad daylight for everyone to see and gawk at them. Her words fall on deaf ears of her brother-in-law as he continues to ignore her as he has for the past five minutes since he scooped her up. “It’s just a sprained ankle.”

“Not going to happen, flower,” he answers with an easy smile on his lips. His wings shift and refold against his back much like Azriel does as he easily strolls through Velaris with no indication of tire on his face due to the fact he’s carrying a fully grown woman.

Female- Fae- High Fae. Whatever.

“Please, Cassian. This isn’t proper,” she whispers, glancing around her before a fresh wave of pain crashes into her bones and she suppresses a pained cry. She’s a married woman, and it isn’t proper to be like this in public; she endorses Azriel’s family’s disregard for propriety and protocol in private, even enjoys breaking a few rules herself, but there are protocols to respect in public- something Cassian does not seem to think of.

“What isn’t proper, Ellie, is letting you walk on that damaged ankle of yours,” he replies, glancing at her uncomfortable face. “Hang in there a couple of minutes. Nearly there.”

“I can walk,” she grits out through clenched teeth.

“I know a bad ankle when I see one,” he reprimands gently, reminding her he has endured a fair share of his own injuries and knows how to catalog them. “You won’t be able to walk for a few days. I can’t let you make this worse, and besides, Nesta would have my head. Not including Azriel when he finds out.”

Oh, _Az_.

She sighs softly at the thought of her absent husband, missing him terribly. Elain missed him this morning too much that it drove her out of the house on a few errands to settle her mind and yearning heart. She was entertaining the notion of buying a tapestry to put in the living space and debating silently on learning how to make one herself to place in their house when Cassian popped up over her shoulder with a chirping hello, startling her into whirling on her feet and taking a step backwards but ended up twisting her right foot between the two motions; she cried out when she felt and heard a small pop in her foot and Cassian paled like he had confronted a ghost.

Which led to her being swept off her feet immediately and being ushered through Velaris like a helpless invalid person while she clung to his neck and fought off crying in pain. It hurt like a- a very rude snake biting her rear. Cassian would not listen to her requests to be put down.

Not that she can actually walk on her leg, but she feels terrible being in this close proximity to a man that is not her husband. Cassian is nothing but a brother to her, but it still makes her feel bad, especially when the muscles beneath her hands and arms remind her of her own spouse on a job on the continent, has been for a couple of days now. She doesn’t think Rhys would make her feel any different either, it’s just that she misses Azriel terribly that everything reminds her of him; the pure sea of Velaris his Siphons, the dark color of the sky his hair, the rising golden morning his complexion, all the fit males in the city his figure, the whisper of wind on a high hill his quiet voice and his gossiping shadows- everything in the world works in cooperation to remind the Seer of her husband to curse her further with a worse case of loneliness.

Elain rests her head on Cassian’s shoulder and her elbow, his scent not at all matching Azriel’s rich opulent musk. She inches her nose further into her elbow to take a sniff of the cologne she’d put a little bit of on her elbow this morning and if she closes her eyes, focuses on the smell, she can imagine him instead of Cassian tending to her. The thought makes her smile before her face twists into one of pain and a moan escapes her tight lips before she can stop it.

“Nearly there, El,” Cassian assures her. He picks up his pace, dodging expertly this person and that as he weaves in between streets and climbs the high roads to reach Feyre and Rhys’s river estate. She sighs in relief at the sight of it, swallowing through a dry mouth when Cassian shoulders through the door and calls for anyone there.

Feyre appears on the landing of the third floor barefoot and in a pale sweater, her hair unbound. “Hey there!” she calls down, then promptly leaps off the edge of the railing and falls through the air, making Elain shriek at the action, until she then lands gracefully on her two feet.

Feyre’s feet, previously two large paws of a cat, retract back into their normal shape. Feyre grins cheekily at them, shifting from one bare foot to the other.

“Neat trick,” Cassian says, impressed despite himself.

“Useful, huh?” grins Feyre. “I’ve been practicing. Oh,” she seems to take in their state and a nonplussed expression takes over her face. “Why are you carrying Elain, Cass?”

“I hurt my foot,” she responds quickly. “It’s fine. He’s just fussing.”

“She hurt her foot,” says Cassian seriously. “Bad sprain. Heard it pop.”

Feyre immediately rushes them to the living space where Elain is finally lowered from Cassian’s arms onto a plush sofa. Feyre isn’t done with the estate (Elain doesn’t think she will in a few years) but they’ve already moved in so the furniture is comfortable, thankfully. Her sister and Cassian kneel on the ground to take a good look at Elain’s hurt foot. She wishes they wouldn’t- it’s too embarrassing but her foot roars in pain now that it’s set on something and not swinging in the air. Feyre reaches out to pull off Elain’s boots but Elain hisses and slaps her hand away.

“I’ll get Madgia,” Feyre disappears in a winnow quickly, leaving Cass with Elain. She blinks furiously to keep out tears of pain- the shock is fading away, leaving her with panic to rumble her abdomen; what’s going to happen to her foot? The boot already feels tight, and hurting. How are they going to get the boot off? Will it hurt? Will she ever walk?

“Hey,” Cass takes her hand in his own large one when she begins to nervously bounce her other knee. “You’ll be fine. It’s all right- it’s just a sprain. You’ll probably be better before Az gets back.”

The thought of her husband makes her throat clog up. She inhales sharply through her nose.

“Hey, tough girl,” Cass says firmly, steering her face to look at him. “You’re going to be fine,” he says it confidently and warmly enough to make her nod.

Madgia tortures Elain quickly, giving the Seer no time to process her intentions as she inspects the injury quickly, Feyre and Cassian moving in sync with the healer; one makes her look at them away from Madgia who busies herself with Elain’s foot and the other holds her legs down and before Elain can take in, the boot is cleanly yanked off in one careful fluid motion and she’s seeing white as she screams.

When her vision clears, she’s sobbing and crying in pain. Madgia has her leg bound very securely and tightly with bandage and Cassian is rubbing her calf soothingly as one might calm down a spooked animal while Feyre is whispering assuring things in her ear.

“You’re fine, see it’s over already,” her younger sister says, smoothing Elain’s hair as she holds her crying head to her chest. Elain sobs, heaving in breath and nodding to say she’s fine now, embarrassed by her tears and pain.

“Wow, Ellie,” Cassian remarks, patting her calf gently as Madgia finishes up her leg. “You were incredibly strong. I once sprained my ankle like that and screamed myself hoarse all the way to the healers. And you wanted to walk on this. Jeez, you’re tougher than you look.”

Elain heaves for breath, wiping away her tears with the back of her hand. Feyre disappears up the stairs for a couple of minutes and comes back with thick socks that Madgia carefully slips on Elain’s two feet.

“There’s a darling. You’re all right now. No walking on this for a week until I check back on it and give the all clear. If it gets too painful in the night, take this,” the kind healer hands Feyre a vial with purple powder in it that reminds Elain of the powder she usually gets Azriel from the same woman for his headaches.

Az- oh, Az.

She’s definitely homesick for him.

Feyre perches on the free space beside Elain’s good knee and takes her hand. “You okay?” she asks with a kind smile. Elain nods, and offers her a shaky smile.

“Thank you for carrying me, Cassian,” the Illyrian Commander rises from his spot on the floor and offers her a smile.

“I’m sorry I startled you. I didn’t think- I’m really sorry.”

“It’s okay,” she crosses her arms over her chest and leans against the cushioned arm of the couch. “Can you take me home, Feyre, please, when you’re up to it?”

Feyre arches a brow at Elain. “What are you talking about? You’re staying here until Az gets back. You’re not staying in that house alone, Ellie. Besides, it must be lonely there.”

“I don’t want to impose,” mumbles Elain, knowing how much of an inconvenience she would become if she stayed here. But Feyre is having none of it.

“Nonsense. We’ll take care of you,” she rises to her feet. “I was working on the upper rooms. Cassian, I have just the job for you.”

Cassian groans and ruffles his hair agitatedly. “How much tons do you need me to move now?”

Feyre smiles a shark’s grin. “A lot.”

In the end, Elain is left on the large comfortable couch to look at the space around her while Feyre makes Cassian haul all sorts of things up the stairs and their chatter fills the otherwise silent house. She smiles at their teasing and jokes, glad Feyre has found this companionship and family for herself.

They weren’t much of a family back in the day before Feyre was taken into Prythian; just a weird dynamic of four people living together in a small cramped space awkwardly trying to survive the days. They didn’t have much friends either, just Elain’s passing by village acquaintances so for Feyre to have this, this companionship in so many forms pleases Elain who has always wished to make her little sister smile and be happy, even when they had next to no money for food, Elain remembers purchasing rare paint because Feyre’s smile upon receiving the gift is always worth going hungry for a few days; besides, a satisfied belly lasts for a few hours, but Feyre’s painted surfaces last decades and forever in Elain’s heart.

She’s been informed by Feyre that her and Rhys plan on having their child soon; they’ve both stopped taking their contraceptive in order to allow it to happen and the thought of a little nephew or niece brings such joy to Elain’s heart in a way that cannot be surpassed, except maybe only by the thought of her own child. She would love to have a small army of children as her own; a whole troop of nephews and nieces running around this estate and Elain’s home, and through Velaris.

But first, her husband needs to actually make it home.

She didn’t take well to this environment at the start; was intimidated by the larger-than-life and loud presences of the Inner Circle and their easy comradery. It took her time to find her own little nook in this family where she can exist peacefully without being scared away and it just so happened that Azriel sharing a similar corner with her made everything a much easier transition than would be expected.

Evening comes, and the smell of dinner starts to waft through the house, courtesy of Nuala and Cerridwen undoubtedly. Feyre seems to be on the last of her work for Cassian who now has grown bored of hauling boxes up the stairs from the basement, now taking to tossing them up in the air and surging after them with his wings. Elain has memorized the trek the two have taken from the basement up to the last floor of the house, a comic sight they were as she spent the whole time unproductively still on the couch.

“I’m home!” she hears Rhys call from the front door when he comes back and makes his way into the living space she occupies. “Oh, hello, Ellie,” Rhys leans over the back of the couch to her and kisses her forehead. “Lovely to see you, darling.”

She smiles at him as he straightens and calls out to Feyre. Cassian is heard shouting to him from the top floor, something about containing Rhys’s wife and granting him mercy. Feyre does that neat trick of hers she did earlier and makes Rhys shriek like a ten year old girl when she lands on her feet.

The whole house erupts in laughter at his high pitched screech and Rhys starts lecturing the grinning Feyre.

“I swear you’re a child,” he huffs when she silences him with a smothering kiss. “Am I to expect you cawing like a rooster at the break of dawn?”

Feyre’s blue eyes gleam. “I hadn’t thought of that. Thanks, baby.”

Rhys groans exasperatedly against her lips and tightens his arms around her as Cassian makes an immature show of gagging. Elain smiles down at her hands and wonders when her shadowsinger would make his way back to their nest.

That night she sleeps on the couch despite being offered a room. It’s too comfortable to move away from and Elain’s exhausted. She’s deep asleep when her foot decides to be a nuisance and scream its pain at Elain and shake her awake.

The powder is just on the table, an arm’s reach away but she’s too tired and in pain to move. She stares at it in the dark, wishing it can magically move and appear with a glass of water to quench Elain’s flaring pain.

The front door opens and swings shut silently, and someone makes their way through the dark expertly. She perks up at the almost muffled movement, her heart picking up its rate as she recognizes the whispers and hisses, the darkness shifting and shadows rushing to a source. Sure enough, soon a familiar figure enters the dark living space, his silhouette outlined by the faint faelight out in the hallway. Elain smiles sleepily despite her pain as Azriel’s form walks towards her and kneels on the ground before the couch she occupies.

She feels his hand touch her face in the dark and his soft lips press to her forehead a second later and his other hand touches her foot, just above the bandages peeking from under the fluffy socks. He kisses her once and then again, then smooths her hair.

“Awake?” he murmurs extremely quietly.

“Yes,” she answers softly.

Faelight comes to life gently in the corner, giving a soft glow to the space and allowing her sight of his handsome face. She beams at it and holds out her arms for a hug.

“Are you okay?” Azriel asks as he embraces her carefully. “Your leg.”

“I am,” she hugs him tighter, truly feeling better in his presence. “I missed you.”

He exhales softly in her hair and pulls back. “Me too. A lot.”

She looks up at his tired features amorously and kisses the corner of his mouth. “Can you give me that, please?” she gestures to the vial. “My foot hurts a bit-”

He fetches it before she manages to finish her sentence, disappears to the kitchen and appears a few seconds later with a glass of cold water. Azriel perches on the empty space by her waist and hips as he pours some of the powder in the drink and holds it to her lips as she drinks.

Elain holds his wrist as she drinks and tugs him close when she finishes the drink. Az slides onto the couch, snugly fitting right behind her. She sighs in content, leaning against his chest as she fits between his legs and holding his arms to her happily. She feels him kiss her shoulder and then her neck, stroking her arms while he pecks her skin and stills.

 _Welcome home_ , she thinks happily as her eyelids slide shut and the warmth of his presence envelopes her snugly, _both of us._


	9. This party is boring and we were both dragged here against our will. Do you want to get ice cream?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (in which Elain meets Azriel, both students figuring out their lives, but soon realising one thing) 
> 
> this shit is so sweet I actually warn you beforehand. Warning, there is a mention of a side character committing suicide due to postpartum depression. Also, I am not unconvinced SJM did not have Harry Potter in mind when she made up Azriel. Enjoy. Long one.

She meets him in the dormitories laundry room. It is 3 a.m, she had neglected her laundry for two weeks since the semester started as she took her sweet time settling in and upon her rummaging through her belongings after a late shower in the shared bathroom, she realized she hadn’t any clean clothes except for a pair of workout pants and a sports bra.

Which is why Elain found herself hopping down the stairs of the old building down to the laundry room with a large hamper filled with her clothes, dressed in her work out pants and a sports bra with her damp hair hanging in strands down her shoulder and back.

She wiggles the door handle open and pushes the door wide with her hip, and is then surprised to see the lights turned on and one of the washing machines going- turns out she isn’t the only slacker. Elain makes her way into the laundry room further, counting down the machines to the one she has been told works best when she sees the fellow college student who is here before her.

She doesn’t know what she was expecting, nothing really crossed her mind when she realized someone else was up at three in the morning to do their laundry but it isn’t _this_.

The most beautiful creature she’s ever laid eyes on (including her celebrity crushes who suddenly scatter from her mind as she tries to grasp a standard to compare with) is sitting on a washing machine with one leg dangling off and the other tucked under his knee, clad in grey capri jogger shorts and a white might-be-a-size-larger-or-this-is-what-people-call-fashion tank top. Somewhere in Elain’s mind, she is protesting at her sudden loss for words and the dryness of her mouth but she can’t tear her eyes away from the too-good-to-be-human sitting right in front of her.

He is flicking through a fashion magazine with a bored expression on his face (his _face_ : Elain felt it inappropriate to think any of it. Save that her eyes suddenly weren’t attached to her skull and she was melting) and a sign of his boredom is the bandana he has tied at his hairline, giving more volume to his hair (which Elain reckons must feel like the softest thing in existence. It looks fluffy and well cared for) and his idle flicking through the men’s magazine.

He looks up when Elain pauses a short distance away- he is sitting on the washing machine next to the one she intended on using and his thick eyebrows knit together in momentary confusion before he offers her a smile and she is gone by then. No man should be allowed to dress like that, she reckons. 

A surge of respect for the dress code in school and their typical “It’s distracting to the students, young lady” surges through her conscious because looking at this chiselled Greek warrior, she knows she wouldn’t have ever looked once at trigonometry or listened to Shakespeare in her life were he in her class. It’s hard to peel her eyes away from those toned, muscled arms to meet his eyes, but when she does that’s her mistake. There is absolutely no safe place of him to look at.

She tears herself violently in her mind from her silence and returns the friendly smile, nowhere near as charming as his, and turns to a random machine –no _way_ is she going to use the one next to him when the whole room was empty and free- then opens it up to begin her laundering, impossibly self-conscious of every breath she took, her own clothes, every movement and every glance she glanced. For his part, he remains seated and attention directed at his magazine until he noticed the machine she is using.

“That one’s out of order,” he speaks softly, startling her to high heavens. For fudge cakes’ sake, even his voice has to be smooth and soft and low. 

He’s definitely a fairy, she determines in her head. A magic laundering fairy waiting at three in the morning for helpless girls like her to lure her away and snatch her from their world- disturbingly, she can’t bring herself to mind. Her mind is feeling lucid with the lack of sleep and she argues with herself that of all the fairy tales she’s been told, not one mentioned the villain being a drop-dead beautiful creature with a body chiselled by artists. She blames Disney for this rude awakening and feels grateful for the 18+ shows that have been coming out shedding light on this very important and grave issue of no one ever telling children the villain can be someone straight out of their fantasizing dreams.

“Huh?” she answers intelligently.

“That one doesn’t work,” he replies. “Neither do these,” she follows his arm’s gesture to the row of washing machines across from them, busy trying to tear her gaze away from his tanned lean arm. “And these two,” he jerks his chin towards the two on his right against the wall.

Her brow furrows up in confusion as she takes in his words. “Is there an epidemic attacking washing machines?”

He grins with a huff of laughter- sweet baby puppies and furry possums, she’s done for. “I think they’re old. Or whoever using them doesn’t know how to use them properly.”

“They need to find a retirement home,” she pulls back her stuffed clothes and right into her hamper. Oh, God, what is she saying? Is she thinking herself funny or witty? “Is there one?”

The cruel fairy’s smile stays on his soft-looking lips- he’s definitely a dream of hers. “Well. In Astro Boy maybe.”

Her heart clenches tightly as she resists the uncharacteristic urge to swear. At least now she has a reason to use the washing machine next to him- to her dismay, he hops off his throne of washing machine seduction. She feels like moaning _‘No, come back!’_ like she’s just frightened away a butterfly or a puppy.

“Wait, how do you know this?” she asks, her own lips curving into a grin. “Did you try them all?”

He holds out his arms to his sides and shrugs, his face definitely bored. She very adamantly keeps her eyes fixed on his eyes even if it’s a trap. “I’ve been here since eleven. I’ve even written a complaint about this.”

“God grant me your patience,” she mumbles, stuffing her clothes quickly into the machine, discreetly hiding her underwear in a large shirt. “At least you’ve got the sense to try relatively early. I’ve been postponing this.”

“I was so pissed,” he elaborates, leaning against a machine next to his occupied one. Elain focuses hard on putting her clothes in and not looking at his muscled arms- she’s a special weakness for lean muscled guys: she can’t find it in herself to get on board with the large muscled type as her sisters do, finding that she prefers the lean, broad-shouldered and handsomely shaped type. “I didn’t have it scheduled but my brothers paid me a visit.”

“Oh let me guess, they crashed your room, puked all over your clothes and decided to throw your clothes out of the window so you won’t notice,” she rolls her eyes at the memory of her sisters doing just that. As if Elain wouldn’t notice her favourite Hufflepuff sweater missing and then proceed to hunt it down through all faces of the earth.

“And they decided to attempt bleaching some of them,” he adds, not looking that bothered for someone who had their clothes assaulted- she wouldn’t be too bothered if she had a form like his and she hadn’t anything to clothe herself with (she flinches internally when she thinks that; what is _wrong_ with her this late hour?). “In my roommate’s fish tank.”

“That’s horrible!” she says before she can think and notice they’re not allowed pets in the dorms. She closes the machine, her hamper far from being empty but it’s all she’s allowed now. She’ll have to do the whole cycle again.

“I caught them last minute,” her fairy says. “It would have been a disaster. My roommate would have hated me for eternity.”

“Mine keeps to her corner of the room and doesn’t speak. I’m not sure she’s not mute.” Mutters Elain, standing up and looking for her detergent then pouring in a generous amount. “I don’t know if she hates me or just abhors human interaction.”

“Mine used to be friendly,” shrugs the mystery boy who she’s three quarters sure is a trick of her imagination. “Until my brother broke his laptop. Now he pretends I don’t exist. Which sucks when you’re down with a nasty stomach virus.”

“Is your brother the Hulk, or something?” she says despite herself as she looks for her softener and realizes she’s lent it to the girl down the hall who hasn’t yet returned it. “Damnit,” she hisses quietly, clenching her hands into tight fists. She really likes her clothes to smell nice and is bothered to no end that she’s condemned herself to the life of plain-smelling clothes.

“Or something,” he hops on top of an out-of-order machine. “Something wrong?”

“A girl took my softener,” she rubs her forehead wearily. “She forgot to give it back. I’m too embarrassed to ask her for it.”

“Huh,” she senses more than sees him shift on the machine behind her back when she’s struck with the thought of her bare back, bare abdomen, bare arms and internally panics. “Do you plan on asking her for it?”

“Is it rude?” she turns, nibbling on her thumbnail and bracing her arm across her stomach to give herself a resemblance of modesty. He ponders her question, his long legs swinging forwards and backwards as he does (she pointedly stares at his cheek) then shrugs those shoulders of his. 

“I’d just let it go. Too awkward.”

She nods wholeheartedly, immensely relieved there’s someone who agrees with her on this- she’s tired of eye rolls and people telling her to grow a spine and ask for what is hers. “Right?”

“Use mine,” she almost blanches as he nods his head towards the detergent and softener set on the ground beside the whirling washing machine. “I don’t mind, really.”

“I-Uh…I..” she fidgets with her fingers then remembers her state and crosses them over her chest. “It’s not fair that you-“

“I don’t mind, honestly, unless you do. It’s fine.” She wonders what four hours of attempted laundering must do to someone to make them this laidback- perhaps it’s his personality? Or, more likely, the softener is a trap to secure her for his fairy sacrifices.

“Thank you,” she caves and reaches for it then carefully uses the bare minimum. Elain joyously turns the machine on and watches it in delight as it starts the laundering. Only one more batch of clothes to go. “Oh, what’s your name?”

“Azriel. Sorry I didn’t introduce myself,” he holds out his hand for a handshake. 

“Elain. Not at all, I think we’re both excused for the late hour.” She grins slightly and clamps his hand in her own. The cold tips of his fingers clamping around her hand make her shiver –or that’s what she tells herself. Not that she’s touching him- and when they let go, she rubs her hands over her biceps to initiate warmth.

Just then, one of the dryers come to a smooth end, signalling its job well done. He swings his hamper off the floor as he makes his way over to it and extracts the crispy warm clothes. She only allows her a single glimpse of his shoulders that the loose tank top allows before she averts her gaze.

“You look cold, Elain, would you like a sweater?”She whirls around on her heel faster than a bottle spun in a game of Spin The Bottle when he says the words. He’s holding a thin navy sweatshirt in his hands, a hesitant look on his face- Elain gives him the benefit of the late hour, and gives herself that too as her whole conscious screams _Yes! Yes! Give the precious to us!_

Calming her inner Gollum, Elain touches an icy hand to her chilly hair and thinks she’ll catch a cold for this. He must have been taken aback by the temperature of her hand though not showing it.

“If it’s not a bother,” she whispers shyly, a breeze of the chilly October wind, feeling heat rush to her cheeks. “I just showered, don’t worry.”

He grins brightly, eyes crinkling at the corner in a crow’s feet – _THAT’S IT_ , every fibre of her being screams, _MARRY HIM RIGHT NOW_ \- and holds out the warm sweatshirt. Elain accepts it with a hesitant hand, then pulls it on and resists the urge to sigh in relief as warmth seeps into her spine.

“Thank you,” the sweatshirt reaches her waist and the arm sleeves are only a little longer as they go past her thumb. It’s incredibly soft and feels well-loved but kept in perfect conditions. “Are you an angel?”

Her heart takes a leap into her throat when his face goes a warm shade of pink and he turns away. She buries her nose into the sweatshirt, relishing in the clean smell and scent of the softener as her eyes travel to his legs embarrassedly.

Which is her mistake, ultimately, because Elain being Elain with her soft spot for perfect lean legs finds that she’s utterly captivated by the justice the Capri jogger shorts does to his legs as the banded ends cling to the space below his knees. They’re long, well portioned, the muscle clearly exercised enough and that’s the sweet thing of his appearance; everything screams effort put in, but just enough and not too much.

Elain dislikes the hipster style, as opposed to her younger sister Feyre’s taste, and dislikes the bad boy style which Nesta is a fan of (in denial, of course, the physics majoring student would never utter the confession) and Azriel before her looks like the image of perfect casualness, she supposes, but in an accidental way.

Boy’s haircuts nowadays feels like they are erecting cylindrical towers of hair on their heads that don’t match their face’s shape at all, and are so attentive in making sure no hair escapes the diligent wrath of hair gel that it looks utterly irritating and induces Elain’s craving for giving in to the chaos and anarchy of the universe.

But him- oh, him, the bandana tied around his hairline flips his hair and fringe back in an effortless look. His eyebrows aren’t plucked or shaved, but the messy and jagged outline of theirs at their curve is utterly seducing to her eyes. His broad shoulders, his arms, his legs. He’s the perfect balance between a skinny boy and a bodybuilder.

SNAP OUT OF IT, she internally screams at herself, mortified with the trail of her thoughts and her ogling. She’s never been before like this with her ex-high school sweetheart Graysen much less a _stranger_. She turns her back on him to enforce curfew over her wandering eyes and pretends to sort through her remaining dirty clothes while he folds his.

“Wh-what are you studying?” she asks hesitantly in an attempt to keep awkwardness from descending over them.

“Homeland Security,” he pipes up immediately. “My major. Law Enforcement for minor. What about you?”

“Agriculture,” she throws a smile over her shoulder and is surprised to see him looking at her. “I’m thinking of plant sciences later on.”

“Why did you choose that?”

“I love plants!” she grins widely and feels her enthusiasm for her career plans rally up down the road and march eagerly. “I love gardening! I used to keep a garden back home. I don’t know what I’d choose else.”

“Have you been to the green houses?”

“What? No. Are there any here?”

“Yeah,” he nods. “Fifteen-minute drive from campus. You should talk to your professors about organizing a trip there- oh, are you part of the Green Club?”

“You bet I am,” she puffs out her chest and throws back her shoulders. “I signed up first thing.”

“You should go there for a trip,” he suggests. “They’re really nice. You wouldn’t regret it.”

“I’ll let them know next meeting,” Elain promises solemnly. “What about you? Why’d you choose this path?”

His hand movements slow down, and his gaze is fixed on the t-shirt he’s folding carefully. “I grew up in worse parts of the city,” he says carefully. “It wasn’t easy. I told myself if I ever got out of there I’d work to make it a better place.”

Elain finds no words to say and simply nods with a faint “Yeah”. She watches him fold his clothes and then notices the scarred tissue over his hands. They’re spread along with his fingers and palms and upper side. They look old and faded, but still there to remain forever. Wondering what life he’s led, Elain turns back to her laundry.

They don’t have much of a conversation for the rest of the time spent together, and Elain thinks it’s quietness between comfortable and awkwardness but it makes him feel real to her and not a wickedly handsome fairy- she still thinks he’s a figment of her imagination. He leaves the laundry room before she does, parting with a smile and a murmured “Good night” to her. She goes to bed that late-night still dressed in his warm sweatshirt, wrapped in the scent of his softener and detergent, her clothes sharing the same scent, and she thinks that she’s harboured a full-time crush on an actual person for the first time in her life.

______________________________

The second time she runs into him, it’s in her English class. She’s a bit late for her morning class having overslept, and rushes into the large lecture hall through the back door to seek refuge in the back. Most of the students are gathered as close as they can to the professor, a few scattered in the back so she takes the first seat she comes across, right beside a boy with his earphones in and watching a YouTube video compilation of cats.

When she settles in, her pen in hand and her notebook out ready to be filled with notes, she chances a glance at him and instantly beams. It’s Azriel.

Excited, she taps his elbow eagerly. He jumps, turning sharply to her, eyes an off-putting expression of coldness and unfriendliness upon what she likes to call his ‘resting bitch face’ before he recognizes her.

The magic she witnesses next still baffles her every time she thinks about it; his whole face melts as his eyes spark with recognition, his lips stretch into a friendly smile that crinkles his eyes like they did last time, revealing a row of brushed neat teeth.

“Hi,” he says in a warm tone as he plucks out his earbuds and pausing the video on his smartphone.

Elain smiles back and opens her backpack, pulling out the folded sweatshirt she has been carrying around with her on the chance of running into him. “Hey. This belongs to you.”

“Oh right,” he takes it and stuffs it into the backpack at his own feet. “Thanks.”

“No really, thank you. You saved my sorry delusional butt that night. I didn’t know you take English with me.”

He shrugs, his lips twisted into a private smile. “I keep to the back.”

“I now notice,” Elain smiles, then notices the lack of any notebooks or tablets for note-taking on the table. “You don’t take notes?”

“Not in the morning,” Azriel replies, rubbing his eyes. “Too tired. Besides, everything’s on the web.”

“True that,” she twirls her pen in hand. “Why come at all?”

He gives the reason three-quarters of students give: attendance.

“I’ll let you in on a secret,” she whispers, leaning in. “I take notes to stop me from falling asleep. And I don’t have time to get some coffee before class to. So I sit in front to keep me awake.”

“My secret’s YouTube,” he taps his phone. “Saves me every time.”

“Cat videos, I’ve noticed,” she grins as his cheeks colour. “So you’re a cat person?”

“I don’t know. I’m a fan of anything that makes me laugh. Cat compilations seem to be doing just that.”

“Have you ever tried Try Not to Laugh Memes?”He shakes his head with a nonplussed expression on his face. She eagerly holds out her hand for his phone, “May I?”

Elain finds herself and her new friend spending the rest of the hour and a half lecture with shared earbuds in the back of the hall watching videos on YouTube and trying not to laugh as they click from video to video. Elain’s notebook is pitifully empty, with only the date scribbled on it but her lips have never smiled so early in class so far.

Azriel invites her to go fetch coffee before their next respective classes for some well-needed caffeine boost. She eagerly agrees.

____________________

The third time she runs into him, it’s at a house party on Halloween. Whenever she sees him on campus she always comes over to say hello and he shows up at their English classes before her with coffees for them both. Elain’s now friends with him on Facebook and Twitter, and has tried to tell Nesta about him but could never find the courage to do it- she doesn’t know why, all she knows is that she wants to keep him her secret, her own special thing away from anyone else. Besides, she knows what her sister will say; claim it’s too early to move on from Graysen, and too early to think of a relationship or whatever she has on Azriel. Elain doesn’t want that sensibility, not when she always looks forward to seeing him whenever she can, and that whenever she runs into her friend she always counts the day a good one.

She tried showing him to Feyre once when her high school drop-out sister visited her dorm, and she felt horribly violated when Feyre gagged at the picture of him, telling Elain she has the worst taste in men. Elain didn’t know what came over her, but she felt terribly angry and offended, then spent the next half hour talking Feyre’s ear off about him and why he was the perfect balanced beauty, how every feature of his was perfectly tipped and that maybe the picture didn’t do him good or it was old or Feyre was terribly blind.

“I mean, he’s not ugly, he’s just not- not _hot_ , Elain,” Feyre stammered, interrupting Elain’s shouting. “I mean, if you’re going to crush on someone, crush on someone like Tamlin Rose or Chris Hemsworth!”

“That hipster garbage?!” shouted Elain about Rose, the music student three years older than Elain. “He’s nowhere near Az!”

“Or like, Lucian!” Feyre suggested. “He’s hot. Just your type, Ellie. Ruggedly handsome, looks like a tough prince charming with a brain-“

“Don’t mention him,” Elain stomped her foot down, remembering the awkward conversation she had with Vanserra who’d asked her out last week. “And Az is a genius! He’s literally the top of his major!”

Feyre scrunched up her nose. “I don’t know about that, Chief. I’m just saying you can do better.”

“That’s rich coming from someone who likes _Tamlin Rose_ ,” snarled Elain. She swore after then that she would never ever let Feyre in on any guy she liked, too scared her sister would think her dumb or her taste awful.

Which she argues every day that it is most definitely not. She thinks that when she is in the Halloween house party, brought here against her will by Nesta and a Feyre who got invited by the aforementioned Rose, and she’s sitting on a couch while people around her play party games and drink themselves under the table.

She catches a guy’s eye across the living room and averts her gaze quickly. She doesn’t have terrible taste in men, she just doesn’t like extremes. She acknowledges the beauty of the men her sisters find attractive, but it’s like a too-sweet dessert that you can’t have all of. Their looks are overwhelming and just too beautiful that Elain doesn’t think she’ll be able to look at them for more than one minute.

But the guys she like, they’re the perfect balance that Elain can look at all day and lose herself in their features without being overwhelmed. They’re the practical spouse to have, to like, to love because their looks are real, close to the heart, classical and relaxing.

Her sisters ignore her every time she tries to explain.

“Elain?” a familiar voice calls over the blaring pop music. She turns halfway on the couch and lights up like a Christmas tree when her gaze lands on Azriel.

How can you not find him attractive? She thinks soundly as she takes in his lazy costume.

Black thick boots, equally black slim skinny pants, a puffer –surprise- black vest zipped up. There’s makeup of wounds on his toned arm, and dark shadows on his face and darkened lips. Her eyes linger on his bare tanned arms brought out in full effect with his vest that harbors nothing beneath, and tries to remember how normal breathing goes.

“Hi!” God, her voice is awfully high pitched and too cheerful. He must think her clingy. “Don’t you look… dashing.”

He scratches his lean neck sheepishly. “Is that a… Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire reference? And if so, is my outfit that bad?”

She swears her face is that heart-eyes emoji. MARRY HIM! MARRY HIM! MARRY HIM! Every part of her chants over and over.

“Heart-eyes, mothertrucker,” she blurts out aloud then her own eyes widen in terror while his brow furrows.

“What?”

She waves it aside vehemently. “It’s been stuck in my mind all day,” she lies quickly. “I’ve said that to the barista at the coffee shop today and the librarian.”

His lips bloom into a wide grin. “What are you supposed to be?”

“Pregnant!” she hops up with grace said woman would never have and smooths a hand over her fake baby bump. “That’s scary enough!”

He laughs, doubling over as he grips his knees with scarred hands. Elain blushes to her ears but can’t help her own giggling. “That’s genius.”

“Thank you,” she pretends to model her current pregnant momma state. She’s dressed in plain black, a tank top and skinny jeans with dark makeup and cat ears. “What about you?”

“I don’t know, really,” he pats down his fringe that has been styled away from his face out of habit. “My friend said this works. She did the makeup. Apparently, I’m spooky enough as it is.”

“You’d make a good Batman.”

“Nah. Tired of it. Besides, I’m not an orphan.”

“Ooh, but you’re the son of a billionaire?” she woos and watches his smile fade on his lips a touch, losing their cheer.

“Kind of.”

“Oh?” she perks. “Do tell! Who’s your Dad?”

As Azriel casts his eyes away, Elain realizes how uncomfortable and unwilling he is to share this so she quickly moves on. “I would be Batman, but I’m afraid you all won’t be able to handle the terrifying darkness that would be me. Besides, I wasn’t up to coming here, but my sisters dragged me here last minute.”

His lips quirk up at the corner, gaze returning to her briefly before he looks around the party. “This party is boring,” he notes. She hums in agreement; both her sisters have abandoned her for their own entertainment. “And we’re both here against our will. Do you want to get ice cream?”

“Is that a question?” she demands. “Of course. Oh, let’s go get pizza and then ice cream, what do you think?”

“Sure,” he smiles that smile of his she has grown to love. “I’ll take you to my favourite place.”

“Let me fetch my jacket and tell my sister,” she leaps over the couch, her baby bump going crooked before she fixes it and hunts Nesta down. She is with her friends, playing beer pong with others and waves her away with a nod when Elain shouts her plans.

Neither of them have a car so they walk the distance. Being the unfit person she is who has neglected to work out for the past three weeks, Elain is soon winded and struggling for her life, trying to breathe.

“I’d blame it on the pregnancy,” an un-winded Azriel teases as they stroll the dark street. Most of the trick-or-treaters have gone home, leaving behind teenagers roaming the streets with laughter and tricks. Elain shoots a jealous glare at his long lean legs that make walking the street in two steps easier than eating a piece of cake. “But you’re not even that far to be exhausted.”

She slaps his arm and heaves for breath, subconsciously placing a hand over her fake bump. “Don’t be… mean.”

He laughs and holds out his elbow. Fighting a smile, Elain reaches out and loops her arm through his, allowing him to pull her forward in stride with him. When he shortens his steps and slows down, she takes time to catch her breath and her second-hand finds a warm home on his bare forearm. She tries to resist the blooming feeling that takes over her chest when he places a scarred hand on that hand of hers. _But_ , she finds herself thinking, _oh let it bloom; a flower in my chest, the first of a full garden to grow with him._

She glances at his handsome face, the many secrets and stories woven in his eyes, and leans closer to him. _If he’ll allow me._

_____________

_“O mio babbino caro  
Mi piace è bello, bello  
Vo'andare in porta rossa  
A comperar l'anello!  
Sì, sì, ci voglio andare!  
E se l'amassi indarno  
Andrei sul ponte Vecchio  
Ma per buttarmi in arno!  
Mi struggo e mi tormento!  
O, Dio, vorrei morir!  
Babbo, pietà, pietà!”_

The last of the gentle opera fades into the background of her room, leaving behind a sweet and sacred hush to the atmosphere that feels too magical and otherworld-ly to disrupt. Elain’s knees sway back and forth slowly, then smiles faintly when it plays again on Azriel’s phone being put on loop. This is the fifth time it’s played and they haven’t spoken a word since it began. She can’t look at his face, fearing the raw emotion that might be displayed on there surely as it is on her face.

She sighs softly at the harmonious note and absent-mindedly twirls a lock of her hair on a finger. Staring up at the ceiling, laying down on her mattress and listening to the opera, she thinks of her late mother- her sweet smile, her caring arms, the tone of her voice as she sang. Elain touches her free hand to her throat, feeling the thin chain that disappears behind her neck and the vintage locket with it.

 _“Oh my dear papa,  
I love him, he is handsome,  
I want to go to Porta Rossa  
To buy the ring.._” Elain sings softly when the aria becomes a melody, staring up at the ceiling but seeing the warm golden light of memory following her mother’s smile. She feels Azriel’s head shift sharply on the mattress next to hers and his face observing her. She closes her eyes, lips twitching softly.

The song pauses midway and Azriel breaks the precious silence with a curious question. “What does it mean?”

 _“Oh my dear papa,”_ Elain softly hums, singing.  
 _I love him, he is so handsome.  
I want to go to Porta Rossa  
To buy the ring!  
Yes, yes, I want to go there!  
And if my love were in vain,  
I would go to the Ponte Vecchio  
And throw myself in the Arno!  
I am pining, I am tormented!  
Oh God, I would want to die!  
Father, have pity, have pity!  
Father, have pity, have pity!”_

Azriel watches her with a focused face that meets her gaze when she opens her eyes. She smiles lazily at him and her fingers brush against the chain on her neck. “My mother used to sing it to me all the time,” she shares in a quiet, sentimental voice. “It’s my first memory of her. We used to have a garden when Nesta and I were kids, we lived in this mansion. She would take me there when it was sunny, and sing it to me. Then she sang it to me all the time. It reminds me of her.”

Azriel turns on his side, tucking his arm under his head. The sun from her windows streams onto his form with the breezy weather of oncoming spring, casting him in golden light silhouetting his form and turning his dark hair a rich light brown. “This is the first time you mention her.”

“You’ll make a wonderful detective,” she laughs, a tinkering song; the chiming of a bell to a flower shop in early summer on a hot day, a chilly flower shop with an air conditioner and fresh with the smell of flowers and plants. “But yes. I know. I don’t talk about her a lot, much less at all. My family is bitter about her, and any mention of her is enough to sour the mood. I learned to keep the memory of her to myself.”

“What did she do?” he whispers.

She stares at his cheek, then tugs at the chain and pulls out the locket. She traces the mandala pattern etched onto the vintage locket with a clean nail and clicks it open. “After she gave birth to Feyre, she got sick with postpartum depression,” she says softly, sadly taking in the beautiful smiling features of her mother’s photograph, her hair that is Elain’s tied in a braid over her shoulder, kind eyes twinkling in the colored photo, and her lips smiling a sort of secretive smile only she knew what it was about. “I didn’t know, just that she changed so much. A month later fighting it, she killed herself.”

Azriel’s steady breathing comes to a sudden halt.

“It’s… complicated. Nesta despises her for it, and hates that she didn’t love Feyre as well as she did us. Dad is torn, so he doesn’t say anything. But Feyre hates herself for it when she found out. I told her Mum was just sick, but she won’t believe it. Feyre’s been difficult about it since she found out.”

“I’m sorry, Elain.”

“This is her,” she smiles and shows him the open locket. She smiles wider when his breath hitches as he looks at the woman who Elain resembles uncannily. “I know. I look like her.”

“A lot,” he is so close Elain can smell the conditioner for his soft hair. She chooses to close the locket instead and tuck it into her pastel pink sweater. “You don’t just look like her. You… resemble her and feel like her.”

“My style, I know,” her eyes crinkle at the corners as she tucks her hands under her head. It’s been two years since meeting Azriel, and every day feels as new and magical as the previous since running into him. There is a sort of Disney magical nostalgia to her days now that she can’t pin exactly, but it feels like her life’s hymn is now complete and proudly singing every day. Like a completion or missing puzzle to her princess-like, fairy tale lifestyle that fits perfectly since meeting him. She feels in her element now more than ever. “I think it was inspired by her.”

He stares at her, his hazel eyes flickering between hers. He’s so close she can see the shades of his eyes, the flicks of colours in them, the trick of the light, his black lashes messily shortly framing them.

She presses play on the song and closes her eyes.

“My dad’s a rich businessman,” he says so quietly, sounding vulnerable. The only sign she is listening is the slight furrow between her brushed eyebrows. “He’s married. But I was born out of wedlock from another woman. I think he loves mum a little, but he loves his wife more or he can’t let go of her. He took me in at first, but my stepmother kept me locked in a cupboard under the stairs and then in the basement when I grew it out. I’d be let out for an hour to use the bathroom, see my mother. My two stepbrothers loved experimenting on me, and one day when I was eight they gave me these- I was only taken to a hospital because the neighbours heard me scream. Then when I was eleven she kicked me out, into the street. My dad let her. I tried to find my mother but I couldn’t, I still can’t, but then Rhys’s mum heard and started looking for me. When she did find me, she hugged me so tight and told me she was so sorry, and for the first time in my life, it felt like having a home.”

She peels her eyes open and holds his gaze.

“The feeling was brief and rare, even when she took me in. I love my brothers, and her and the family they gave me. I just don’t feel that way often, I used to think it’s because of how I am, how… alienated.”

“You’re not-“ she begins saying softly but he goes on quickly.

“But whenever I’m with you, it’s the only thing I feel. Home, like I finally belong somewhere.”

Elain’s breath hitches suddenly in her throat and she holds it in, and the song finally comes to a soft end. Azriel stops it from starting over without breaking his gaze.

She blinks softly, taking in his words. Her chest is blooming a new immortal lily-of-the-valley flower now that joins the others there grown lovingly. She feels her lips part and finds nothing to say.

_Oh my dear Papa.  
I love him. _

His eyes flicker between hers, and then drop to her parted lips for a moment before looking up again. “Elain,” he says, quieter than a burglar breaking into a home. He is like that somehow, has been the moment she ran into him that late night in the laundry room. Only he’s unknowingly robbing her of her heart. “Can I kiss you?”

The room holds its breath, not a single sound daring to break the heavenly silence settling over them. Elain can’t even hear her heartbeat, nor her breathing as she normally would in stifling silence. But this is different- there is nothing in her mind, nothing at all save for a flower blooming in all eternity of golden sunlight triumphing over its kin swaying in a gentle breeze.

When she nods, and he softly presses his lips to hers and kisses her, the room loosens a breathing song, and birds chirp from their perch outside Elain’s window. Spring climbs down from its carriage, all smiles and bright eyes as it pats down its skirt, and the sun shines impossibly brighter.

Somewhere in Elain’s head, a Disney opera hits a high note sharply of Elain’s life tune at the feel of the velvety lips on hers, shyly moving slowly with hers, and her heart flounders as a goddess of earth and life springs from the ground, Mother of Earth, her hair a stream of flowers and leaves as she inhales a breath of fresh life and her green lips of life open so she starts to sing.

The world looks a brighter vivid colour when Elain opens her eyes and their interlocked lips pause. The eyes that meet hers look brighter, happier, and high on the feeling of invigorating revival. An awakening. A realization. A sense of belonging.

She touches his strong jaw with her long fingers that dig life out of the earth and his lips curve against her own.

“Elain Archeron,” his voice sounds a whole new tone belonging to a different man. One who has found his elixir of happiness, whose song has found its missing tune. “I think I’m in love with you.”

“Azriel Bougainvillea,” she whispers back. “I know I am in love with you.”

_____________________

Summer ends in road trips around the country, endless spontaneous little dates walking around cities and antique shops, holding hands, lots of taken pictures, trips to the beach and picnics are the normal default of their day, and in an announcing of their dating to their family.

She’s met his brothers before, had thought them too rowdy and chaotic and loved how easy Azriel was with them. When they announced their relationship, no one was surprised about it so much as they were that they did anything about it. They went out for dinner that night, all of Azriel’s family and Elain’s sisters, to celebrate and the end of the night confirmed Elain’s suspicions regarding Feyre’s recent clinging to Rhys whenever they met. She said nothing when she caught them kissing after dessert in a corner, but simply glanced at Nesta who –with a sour face- slid over a ten-dollar note to Elain on the table, her sour expression going even sourer with the attention she was being paid by the ‘bad boy’ Cassian clad in leather jacket and combat boots. Elain had another bet going on with Feyre about it and suspected she would be five dollars richer by the end of the year.

The new academic year begins stressfully for both Azriel and her, him pressured even more so by his subjects, and her by the two jobs she picked up- her joy, yes, but still fills up her schedule.

By the end of October, she starts to catch him dozing off more and more so every day. She frequents his shared apartment with three other boys and catches him late at night sleeping on his desk over a paper he is supposed to be writing.

She glances at his messy room, so uncharacteristic of him, and then at his dozing face gone tired with workload, his job at the company Rhysand’s father owned, his internship and the second job he has recently picked up for a reason unknown to her- he hates working at the café he does but goes silent when she suggests he quits and doesn’t ever do it. She runs her fingers through his hair, sending the recently cut hair into a messy style, her ministrations loosening the tight expression on his face.

“Come on,” she strokes his hair. She’s just come back from her job at the flower shop and plans on reading for tomorrow’s lecture before going to bed in her apartment. “Lazy bear, sleep on your bed.”

He hums something unintelligible. The aforementioned bed is in an abysmal state mirroring his whole room- it doesn’t look slept in at all. He looks like he hasn’t properly slept in a while.

“Why don’t you sleep at mine tonight?” she suggests, watching his eyes peel open to confirm she is not a dream. His red-rimmed eyes look up at her then blink several times. “Come on, on your feet. You’ll catch a disease in here.”

“’m fine.”

“No arguing. You sound like you’re starting to catch something. I won’t have it. On your feet, muffin.”

He doesn’t argue true to her orders as she tugs on his arm and pulls him up. He grabs a jumper and pulls it over his shirt while she grabs his backpack and slides in his homework. The walk to her apartment is silent as they hold hands, the only sound he makes is a grateful sigh when he steps inside the clean fresh place.

She makes him tea but finds him knocked out on her bed, long gone under the fluffy duvet. It’s a disgustingly happy feeling in her chest when she sees him curled there like a cosy cat, fluffy hair peeking over the edge of her duvet and hiding underneath. Well- at least she has an extra mug of hot tea for herself.

He’s incredibly warm when she slips in next to him at midnight, and he doesn’t move an inch as she carefully cuddles in his side and slings her arm over his waist. Her lips lovingly smile of their own accord and she whispers him a goodnight.

Come November with its cold climate, he warms her whole life one morning at dusk.

It’s a normal thing for them to wake up early and meet up at the other’s place to start their day at a heads start than the world, spending an hour drinking tea and having breakfast as dawn breaks and dusk creeps over the sky, watching the sunrise together.

Just as she finishes her tea and thinks of her outfit for the day, Azriel turns to her. They are standing side by side in her apartment at her window, watching the sunrise quietly, and he sets his mug down on the windowsill, clearing his throat.

“Ellie,” he says softly. “I know I’m not the best in the world for you. And I barely get by with two jobs. I’m not rich like my family, I’m bastard born, I’m adopted, and I’m incredibly moody and you- you’re all the best things in the world combined in one thing. I don’t deserve you, and the universe possibly only conspired to bring us together because it loves you, though not as nearly as I do.”

Elain smiles faintly, tracing the locket hanging around her neck. She put in a picture of him the next day he kissed her. “Is this another self-deprecating episode, muffin?”

“No,” he shakes his head and takes her hand in his scarred one. “This is me knowing my place. And this is me saying to hell with it all. This is me being brave. I want to make an honest woman out of you.”

Dawn breaks over the horizon, the sun curiously peeking over it to witness the magic of the world it has slept on. He kneels onto one knee. He takes her second hand with the one holding her first. Azriel reaches into his backpocket and shows her a small red velvet box. Elain stops her breathing. The birds outside fly to her window and curiously sing a few notes. Azriel looks up at her seriously, his eyes set and gleaming hazel gems on his tan-coloured face. He opens the box with one hand.

“I know we’re young,” he says quietly to her and their silent audience. “I know we’re still students. I know we’re figuring stuff out. I know I’m not well off and my chosen career is a stick in the butt. I know it all. But I want to figure everything out with you, I want the world to change around us with you. I want-“ his voice breaks, choking on the words as his eyes gleam brightly. “I want to have everything with you. I want to give you everything I am. If you’ll have me.”

There are tears streaming down her face.

“Elain, the love of my abysmal life until I met you, the apple of my eye, the Dobby to my sock, the Beauty to my Beast, the sun to my moon, will you make me the happiest man on earth and let me make you the princess of my whole world? Will you marry me?”

Only then does she come back to her body and her trembling knees give out underneath her. She sinks to the ground, tears flowing freely, sobs leaving her lips but never her chest, and she throws her arms around him, sobbing freely into his neck.

“Yes,” she whispers, shuddering and shaking as her dream fairy life unrolls true before her very eyes. “An infinite amount of times yes. Oh my God, yes. Yes. I love you. Yes.”

The sun climbs over the horizon and stands victorious on triumphant feet, throws out his arms and rays and opens his golden lips, serenading the oncoming day in fluttering opera notes of love. And the day is made before it has begun.

They both kneel together, wrapped in the other’s arms, crying and sobbing.

The garden of Elain’s chest brings forth a new flower, a shy aster braving the world with its delicate purple petals stretching out its arms bravely for love. And it gets it, is basked in it, showered and tended and oh so incredibly loved.

It’s a small spring wedding they have over break, with few invitees and a humble ceremony, but –as Feyre put it tearfully, dabbing at her eyes- a pure Disney wedding could not have hoped to live up to it. Nesta shed several tears when Elain said her vows and did not slap away an emotional Cassian’s hand away. Azriel moves into her apartment, her husband, and it feels like another missing piece to a puzzle fitting in place.

Life ends up turning into waking up early, trying not the bother the other, making breakfast, keeping the other company for all-nighters and exams with nourishing snacks and coffee, Azriel walking Elain home from the library on campus at one in the morning, having movie marathons after exam season comes to an end, celebrating a paper with a good grade by playing monopoly and not fighting, putting the other’s towels in the dryer while they’re showering so it’s crispy warm for them, walking around the park, saving up their money for a honeymoon in Europe that they promise will happen one day -maybe when this year finishes, or after I finish this job, or after we graduate, we’re definitely going on one when I settle into my new job, or after spring ends, or let’s wait we spent our savings on our first car- but it never comes.

“I’m going to take you all around Europe,” Azriel always promises, half asleep, as he holds her at night. “And we’ll have the best honeymoon in the history of honeymoon. It’ll be so great that it is a honeygalaxy.”

“Of course you will,” she always teases. “I think we’re going to end up taking our children with us on this honeygalaxy you keep talking about.”

“That’d be something,” he would reply. “A mega honeygalaxy. Like, an amazing honeymoon but better. A mega honeygalaxy. It’s gonna be so good we’ll never come back from it.”

“That’s paradise, Az,” she whispers. “That’s when we die.”

“Hmm,” he would hum and tighten his hold around her. “Paradise doesn’t sound so bad. As long as it’s with you. Promise you won’t ditch me for a handsome angel when we go there.”

“I already have one.”

His lips would draw back and he’d kiss her senselessly lustfully and she’d think, _there is no life better than this. Paradise is any place with you._

_Oh my dear papa,  
I love him, he is so handsome.  
I want to go to Porta Rossa  
To buy the ring!  
Yes, yes, I want to go there!_


	10. Elriel Headcanons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I realised as I was writing these that I was imagining them in a modern!AU setting, so my bad lol sorry but I’m not really sorry, these two give me life

-gardening (Azriel hanging around, holding her things for her while she teaches him)

-softness.

-pureness

-propriety every moment

-Elain makes these scarves for Azriel he absolutely loves

-he’s sensitive about anyone touching his burn scars. He’d flinched when Elain touched them the first time and he explained that it didn’t hurt but the feeling of someone touching him, but not exactly feeling it as sharply and keenly as he would anyplace else of his body unnerves him to no ends.

-he wooed her by taking her to parks and feeding ducks. They went to a dog park where they discovered Elain loved dogs.

-she notices small details about him that escape everyone else, including him. Like when his head hurts, or his shoulders are stiffer than usual.

-at first they didn’t realize they liked each other. Both were blissfully unaware of their affections but still acting on them; Az too busy pinning after Mor, her in love with Graysen. It was painful to everyone.

-he used to see her in the university despite her not attending and him being on and off, waiting for Feyre or Nesta. He’d thought she looked like a vision sitting at the edge of the water fountain.

-she didn’t notice him for a long while. Then she grew accustomed to sitting with him at the water fountain waiting for their friends. She brought him cupcakes she’d made.

-he complimented her scarf and said it was like nothing he’d ever seen before. It overjoyed her because he was the first outsider to notice her handmaid scarves.

-she made him one later. Graysen was stingy about it but couldn’t stay mad with her- who in their right mind could?

-he didn’t really know her, just as Rhys’s crush’s sister and then as Feyre’s sister and then as the woman he couldn’t stop thinking about.

-she was so proper. A real little lady living in her own world.

-Walks around gardens, checking out botany books from the library, quiet hours in the sun, understanding words. 

-they moved in together (with a large garden and an equally large balcony), and adopted a dog. They called him Spots. If anyone thought the name was stupid they didn’t dare voice it, not when Azriel was in earshot.

-he read her books.

-she baked cake for his birthday.

-they adopted another dog. Elain called him Geralt after she found out it was the name of a character in a video game Azriel liked.

-they decorate the house magically every holiday. It’s his secret joy, and Elain loves doing it with him. After she explained she didn’t get much chance to do it growing up, he invested a generous amount of his money into decorations and festivities that brightened her soft lovely smile.

-their first kiss was after they married. She was _that_ proper lady. He never once minded.

-cuddles. So many cuddles. So, so many cuddles with their four dogs (Azriel could never dream of denying Elain anything). Flowers in their house. Scented candles in the bathroom.

-he draws her lovely baths with candles and the proper water temperature. Whenever she’s nearly done with her baths and showers, he puts her towels in the drier so they’d be crispy warm and just right for his Elain when he wraps her in them like a burrito.

_**“You’re my cute burrito.”** _

**_“Can you be my muffin, then?”_ **

_**“I’ll always be your muffin**_.”

-she presses flowers in their books

-she sprays his clothes with his favourite cologne whenever they come out of the laundry and sprays them when they’re in the closet.

-they’re not about vehement and loud showing of affection, just simple every day, every moment touches of love.

-he wasn’t joking when he told Cass he had more game than him and had no need for poetry or stereotypical deceleration of love.

-he buys her little souvenirs whenever he travels, which is a lot. He collects for her a mug from every city or country he goes to, or a spoon, to add to their collection. She eventually asks him if they can go on trips and he has the time of his life taking her on road trips.

-cuddles.

-morning smiles

-forehead kisses.

-brushing of hands while preparing breakfast.

-staring into the eyes of the other.

-cUDDleS

-big spoon, little spoon.

-no fights over the blanket hogging because they’re usually glued together and CUDDLING.

-walking the dogs.

**_“Thank you for saying my family is lovely. We don’t plan on having children yet. Our dogs need us now.”_ **

-they get stopped all the time on their walks because they’re so damn cute and to pet their dogs.

-They slow dance in the living room sometimes, swaying to old tunes while listening to each other’s heartbeat and breathing.

-they adopt a baby orphan who’d lost her parents in the war.

-after six year of marriage, tender loving, six loving dogs, an adopted daughter, a garden, savings in their account to set them for life, Elain becomes pregnant with their first child.

-Feyre and Rhysand’s firstborn son had the whole family twisted around his every needs, but it was nothing like Elain and Azriel’s firstborn. Everyone was concerned with her pregnancy the moment they announced it. Cassian would show up to check on Elaine at random hours of the day when Azriel was away at work with flowers or sandwiches, Feyre took her shopping, Mor came round every day to bring gifts for the baby and take Jenna for dates, Nesta stayed over nearly all day everyday, and her two sisters painted the nursery and worked on it with her. Rhys showes up sometimes late at night with snacks and drinks for her before her cravings even started and it would amuse Azriel to see his brother with avocados or nuts on their doorstep at eleven o'clock.

-he’d remind him that he can fetch his wife whatever she wants.

**_“You don’t know the worst of it yet, man,” said Rhys sagely in the kitchen while Jenna cheerfully ate the chocolate Uncle Rhys had brought her. “Feyre kicked me out of the house at three to find her pickled eggs and peanut butter. Can you imagine?”_ **

**_“Elain’s wildest craving so far has been french fries and mayonnaise,” mused Azriel, eternally grateful his wife wasn’t going for abnormal tastes._ **

-massages

-back rubs, belly rubs, foot rubs.

-cUDDLeS

-“ _No, no don’t look at me. I’m ghastly right now-”_

“ _Love, you’re an angel sent from heaven. You couldn’t look ghastly even if you tried.”_

-Elain’s temper goes as far as stomping her foot down and saying “No!” forcefully with clenched fists and staring at Cassian with an adorably scrunched up face that makes him laugh more and upset her further.

**_“We said no, Cass, don’t disturb us,” Azriel takes her hand and leads her away from everyone._ **

**_“I’m not an adorable fairy!” Elain insists to him as he leads her away. “I’m terrible!”_ **

**_“Of course. Here, sit down and I’ll fetch you some hot chocolate.”_ **

**_“No marshmallows, please.”_ **

**_“Just sprinkles and cream. Got it.”_ **

-celebrating their anniversary at a fancy restaurant where Elain tells him a soft “I love you” and the whole night is just revolving around them exchanging the sentence.

-slow dancing

-DID I MENTION CUDDLES?

-Azriel makes the bed every morning and changes the sheets.

-Elaine opens a flower shop with some of their dogs following her around.

-they don’t fuss over each other when they’re sick BECAUSE THEY FUSS OVER EACH OTHER FOR A LIVING.

-when Elain’s sick Azriel takes the day off from work to stay with her, keep her warm, hydrated and entertained with their small troop of dogs and pet turtle and pet bird to keep her happy. He’ll be very close but NOT cuddling surprisingly to give her breathing space and not let her suffocate. He puts on her favourite cartoons, gives her the white chocolate she doesn’t allow herself daily, makes her herbal tea. She is usually sick every year so Azriel makes sure not to miss out on work throughout the year whenever he can to be able to take care of her when she does fall ill.

-Elain is very protective of him. You’d think just because she was a cinnamon roll through and through and didn’t know a bad word probably meant that she’d be complacent and timid. She is ready to fight fist and elbows for him if she felt he was mistreated or disrespected. She’d given a cashier some vehement and lashing words (in her opinion) for disrespecting her husband and being rude. In his opinion, Elain looked more adorable, and that she was so upset with the situation was what frightened the cashier more than her words.

-these babies invented softness. there is no limit to their pureness.

-when she gets her period they schedule their whole week around it.

-SHE PACKS HIM LUNCH BEFORE HE GOES TO WORK OKAY WHAT DOES THAT TELL YOU

-since she takes longer getting ready for bed, he puts hot water bottles in the sheets on winter nights so his Elain would be all cosy and warm. He buys her some electric rechargeable ones, too.

-they play cards together

-he teaches her some of his favoured video games growing up that he still liked. She confessed that she didn’t like them much but because he did so much she’d learn them.

-she surprises him with video games that just come out that she thinks he might likes. She even buys him a new updated game console that’s very superior to his outdated system from when he was a teen. His jaw had dropped when he unwrapped the gift because she’d unknowingly purchased the newest system out there in the world that if he dreamt of purchasing, he’d carefully plan it out. And despite having money to spare from his generous salary, he never managed to shake off his upbringing.

**_“Do you not like it?” she fidgeted with her fingers hesitantly. “The guy at the store said it was the latest and best. Feyre told me Rhysand was talking about it nonstop since it came out. I wasn’t sure if you’d like it so the man promised me I could return it if you didn’t want it. I… I’m sorry I don’t know much-”_ **

**_He cut her off with a joyous laugh and abandoned the expensive system to wrap her in a sudden bear hug. Geralt and Spots started excitedly barking at the commotion, wanting to join in on the fun. “Elain this is priceless. Thank you. I love you.”_ **

**_She was smiling when he let her go, a blush on her cheeks. “Well, it’s really nothing.”_ **

**_“What’s the occasion, though?” his scarred fingers brushed back a lock of her hair behind her delicate ears._ **

**_“Nothing,” she smiled. “I wanted to make you happy. There shouldn’t be a special occasion for that. You said you weren’t used to spending money on yourself from the way your family treated you. I want to treat you properly, and I want you to enjoy your privileges and life, not shy away from them.”_ **

-she makes him snacks when he’s playing with the boys and others online. They’re filthy-mouthed sailors which is why he wears headphones when he plays with strangers in the game but when it’s just them, Elain is offered the comedic wonder of listening to boys fret over their score and staying alive. It’s so satisfying to watch him beat them at their games over and over, she even cheers him on against Rhys and Cassian. He plays dirty too, invoking psychological warfare on them with teasings and taunts.

_**“You never said Elain’s with you!”** Cassian shouted in outrage._

**_“We’re a team, Cassian,” she answered. “And we’re going to beat you!”_ **

**_ “Nesta asked what I was doing and proceeded to kick me for startling her out of her smutty stories when I shouted in victory.” _ **

**_“What’s-?”_ **

_** “Never mind him, love.” ** _

_**“Feyre’s adamant on joining in,” Rhys’s voice said. “I’m torn between being happy she’s interested in the game as me and seeing her as the enemy I have to cut down.”** _

**_“Feyre’ll save you from that, she’d kick your ass two minutes in.”_ ** _chipped in Cassian._

_**“Oi! Hey- Feyre can you make an account later, darling, it takes time and concentration and I can’t be distracted-”** _

_**“Don’t listen to him, Feyre. You just need an email account and a password along with your credit card and pin. I recommend using KickingRhysandsAs6@everything for the password.”** If a voice could grin, Cassian's was without a doubt grinning wolfishly._

_**“I tried using RhyssWeener but it said it was too short.”** _

_**“The fuck?!”** roared Rhysand while everyone listening on the conversation erupted into laughter. **“Is it Pick on Rhys Day-? AZRIEL YOU SNEAKY BASTARD I’LL HAVE YOUR THROAT-”**_

**_“Go, Az, go!”_ ** _cheered Elain, watching her husband tear through Rhys’s hideout and loot everything the man had hid away then bolt out before he could catch him._

****_**“Elain you’re not supposed to take sides!”** bereaved Rhys._

**_“Who told you that?”_ ** _shot Azriel, leaning forward in the couch as his character sprouted wings from his back and took off. His brothers’ groans of dismay were enough testament to his success. “ **She’s taken my side since the start. If Feyre wants to kick your ass it’s not my problem.”**_

** _“Try these cookies, Az,”_ ** _Elain fetched the cooling baked goods from the kitchen with a glass of milk and placed one between his parted row of teeth, eagerly watching his reaction._

_**“Cookies?”** Cassian’s voice perked, sounding hopeful and yearning._

_**“ Love, if I weren’t hopelessly in love with you I’d marry these. See, Cassian, Elain likes to bake when I’m playing and makes snacks cause she’s worried I’ll forget to eat,”** _ _Az smugly replied, chewing on a chocolate chewy cookie of heavenly origins. **“Physical and mental support, you see. ”**_

**_ “Really?”  _ ** _Cassian’s voice turned hoarse._

_**“Didn’t you make croissants, love?”** Azriel asked Elain who beamed at his compliment._

**_ “Well, it failed so I don’t know if it counts.” _ **

**_ “They didn’t live up to her standards so we spent the whole night eating chocolate croissants while she mastered them,” _ ** _Azriel boasted to the boys, earning groans and whimpers._

_**“I asked Nesta for water once,”** _ _said Cassian quietly in a tone of a tormented soldier right off the battlefield. Well, not yet. Azriel had two more Siphones to collect before them and he’d officially kick their asses. Again._

“ ** _Yeah_** _?” Rhys pressed, trying to make amends for his loss of wings power._

**_ “Told me if I was on fire and she had a glass of water, she’d water the fake plant.” _ **

_Rhys roared in laughter while Azriel grimaced_.

_**“Rhys it wants me to choose a plan, what do I choose-?”** _

_**“Feyre, please, not now. Please.”** _

**_“Just tell me you stupid prick which one to choose!”_ **

“ _ **I’ll set it up for you later, personally, just after I win.”**_

_**“Rhysand if I have to wait for you to win against Azriel in Phrythian Wars I’ll die of old age.”** _

_**“Apply cold water to the burn,”** laughed Cassian._

_**“It’s not my fault I was set up without my powers!”** _

_**“You rely on your privileges way too much, rich boy.”** _

**_“Cassian I swear to God I’ll-”_ **

_**“Az would you like hot chocolate or a latte?”** _ _Elain asked, moving to the kitchen. Sparing her a glance, he saw her opening the cabinets to fetch their two favourite mugs._

_** “Latte, love. Thanks.” ** _

_**“AZRIEL SHUT THE GODDAMN MIC WHEN YOU’RE TALKING TO YOUR WIFE.”** _

_**“I think Rhys is jealous, Elain,”** called Azriel to the angel in the kitchen._

**_“Oh?”_** _her eyes lit with mischief. **“I don’t think we could get him some of the pizza in time, though. Or the lasagne. Too bad**_.”

_** “Elain, what the fuck are you two planning? It’s ten o'clock.” ** _

_** “Watch your goddamn mouth with my wife, Cassian.” ** _

**_ “We’re making dinner!”  _ ** _Elain perked up with a teasing smile._

_**“This late?”** demanded Rhys._

_**“Hello, losers of this game!”** Mor joined in suddenly._

**_ “Boys and intolerable girl, it’s official. Next game night is at Az’s place.” _ **

**_ “What? Why?” _ **

**_ “Elain keeps making him snacks and drinks. They’re having dinner after this; pizza and lasagne,”  _ ** _explained Cassian._

** “ _And macaroni and cheese,_ ** _” added Azriel._

_**“Too bad for you suckers,”** taunted Mor over the microphone. **“I’ve got a whole Tupperware of Elain’s macaroni and cheese right here.”**_

**_ “Bitch.”  _ ** _ Cassian's voice muttered. _

**_“Where did Rhys go?”_ ** _inquired Mor._

**_“AZRIEL YOU FUCKING SNAKE, STOP DOING THAT I’LL SPLATTER YOUR BLOOD OVER THE WALLS YOU OBSTINATE-”_ **

**_ “Language, Rhysie,”  _ ** _ Cassian sang. _

**_“Rhys do I pay in PayPal or with my Visa-?”_ **

**_“Feyre, PLEASE!”_ **

**_“Also, why should I pay beforehand and not after my free trial? This is a scam, isn’t it? Do they give you your money back if you don’t like the game? Rhys did you pay before you played or-?”_ **

_**“Feyre, my account was made ages ago. I don’t remember- AZRIEL GODDAMN IT-”** _

_**“Stop shouting!”** _

**_“I don’t think it’s fair of Feyre to expect a man to play his favourite game and not shout,”_ ** _Elain came back with their two mugs and handed him his drink. Azriel beamed at the contemplating look on her face and nodded._

_**“We need more Elains in our lives,”** _ _Cassian sighed. “ **Yeah, Nesta, I’m totally kicking all their asses. See, I’ve even reached this maze of mud and filth before them, and I’m trapped here until I can make it out with my head on my shoulder- yeah, I know you don’t care, yeah sweetheart- okay, I promise not to call you that again. I’ll keep my voice down. Can I have a cookie, please?”**_

_**“Azriel. Stop. Using. My own. Powers. Against me.”** fumed Rhys._

**_“They’re not yours,”_ ** _Elain retorted, excited at seeing her husband thoroughly win against the game and everyone else. **“They’re for anyone to use. Azriel outsmarted you and is punching you with your own fists.”**_

_Azriel’s beam could light a factory._

_It was quiet on everyone’s line until Cassian piped up **. “But he is, though.”**_

**_“Rhys don’t you dare talk back to Elain.”_ **

**_“Feyre I know you love your sister and I’m fond of her myself but-”_ **

**_“Rhys.”_ **

**_“All right. All right.”_ **

**_ “Oh, Az muffin, you forgot your pills!” _ **

_**“At this point, I’m not even angry or jealous of you,”** Cassian said honestly. **“I’m just withering inside my cold dead body lacking affection and care and I am past the point of wanting, now. You know, Nesta’s most affectionate term of endearment so far as been ‘hey you’. And I think it’s laughable how in love and moved I was when she said them.”**_


	11. Sorry, were you sleeping?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anonymous asked: "“Sorry were you sleeping?” For Elriel?? Please"

Of the many changes that Elain found herself facing since being wrenched out of The Cauldron in a manner akin to that of a drowned rat, strange dreams are the most prominent at the forefront of her mind. As a human, her dreams were not short of odd elements, but they were rare and few in comparison to others that mostly make sense to her mind. But now as a fae, they’re almost consistent and daily, and amplified with many thanks to her visions and newly acquired powers.

Her sister’s husband tried helping; Rhys being so sweet as to attempt carving out time from his busy schedule to help Elain make sense of them and sense of her mind, which is in most current states feels exhausted mentally at best and shut down at worst, but Rhysand with his duties could not make the time for Elain more so than he can make some to spend extra with his mate, and Elain could not find it in herself to hold him to his promise what with her being shy with the attention from a relative stranger, not striving to plant any seed of jealousy or doubt in Feyre’s mind and with how unhelpful the one time he tried to help it was.

Her dreaming is the main reason that her eyes peel apart in the dead of the night and she stares blankly at the ceiling as she blinks several times both to wash away the remnants of the dream from her eyelids and dampen the blear sharpness in her eyes. Elain shifts onto her side, sliding out her arm to scope the large empty mattress she lays on, unfamiliar with the empty space in times like this. She adjusts the pillow under her head and waits for exhaustion to slide her eyes shut.

A minute later, her eyes are wide awake and in her chest is the drumming life of thoughts and alert energy- she immediately knows sleep will not find its sweet way back to her.

Swallowing nonexistent saliva down her dry throat, she sits up, long hair falling unbound and silky against her bare arms that she wraps around her knees brought to her chest. For one small moment, as she sits there in the quiet looking out the windows that frame the wall before her bed, the moon shining bright in one of them, Elain is wrought with an uncharacteristic but grievingly now-familiar sense of stifling loneliness.

It’s not the kind one would be constantly aware of all day, but the sneaking one at her shoulder ready to spring her. Elain has always been a social butterfly, the only one in their family (arguably more than her father) with sweet relations with anything that lived and breathed, she thrived in her familiar environment and loved the feeling of possessively relating to a common shared thing. She had loved her life, loved everything about it, loved that no matter how badly things went they were still things they were familiar with- things that were previously encoded in her society’s dictionary. Poverty, wealth, sickness, death, famine- they were all demons everyone is familiar with, and if one ill befall you, well at least you aren’t the only one.

But there’s a loneliness in the ill-fate befalling her; a flower ripped root and stem from its soil and planted someplace else. Made into a fae, well how many could claim that? Elain cannot find comfort because there aren’t others sharing the experience and it is this loneliness that makes her feel she is up alone against the world and her loneliness.

More so, to add salt to her injury: Gift of Sight. Is there any person before her to have that, even?

The answer, simple and true, is yes. And she’s been given the proof of it, learned about the Seers and their families, guided by her new friend Azriel who brought her books from the library on a topic he felt she might be interested in. The companionship and friendliness she was offered by him was akin to a thirty man wandering the dessert offered a canteen of water, and oh did Elain drink, drink until she had no other thought but of the tasteless feeling in her.

Elain plays with the tips of her hair, tackling the subject of her dreams the only way she knows how; studying the emotions planted in her when she saw them.

The more she thinks, the less safe she feels and the less comfortable she is. She gets out of bed, hovers at the door of her armoire before making up her mind and pulling out her cloak. She slides her feet into her sandals as she fastens it around her, over her nightgown, and pulls the hood over her head.

Quiet as a prayer home’s mouse, she leaves her room and makes sure to silently make her way out of the townhouse she lives in with her sister and her husband. Elain’s aware of how much of a parasite she is being on the couple, and hates expecting them to look after her in every aspect- but she holds onto that, holds onto it with every fiber of her being because it is the one constant thing she has to her life, to Elain; looking to someone for providing.

She wants to change that, but not now. Not when change is the one thing in her mind. Azriel warned her and cautioned her with a tactic used to crack someone wide open, one he used himself: keep the prisoner on the edge, give them no semblance of a routine. Starve them of nutrition and water one day and stuff them with it a couple of days later; keep them awake at night, give them a full day’s rest; be friendly one hour, cruel the other; it is the cruelest way to have a person’s mind and conscious in the palm of your hands. Without routine and stability, you strip a person of their sense of safety and trust and nothing is ever the same for them.

Jolted by his soft words, Elain vowed to listen to him when he told her to allow herself time to adjust. Having a family and friends is about being able to be safely vulnerable while knowing you aren’t going to be hurt, it is about being allowed to recover from anything while being supported, and Elain has that: her sisters, and him if she so desires.

She hopes he’s true as his word, because Elain ventures out into Velaris’s streets with the mission in mind to find him. Nesta is out of the question, what with being away with Cassian and Feyre fast asleep and exhausted from her own tribulations, so that only leaves her with the quiet shadowsinger’s company.

Just as Elain rounds a corner at the end of the street and finds herself at the bridge over the Sidra is she struck with the thought that she has no idea where Azriel resides, and no one else does for the matter. Rhys, who has known him for over five centuries, blanked out when Feyre asked curiously over dinner tonight and admitted, looking a little disturbed, that he does not know, only that whenever he needs him Rhys needs only call for him in his head and Azriel manifests at his side dutifully. Neither do Nuala and Cerridwen when the night’s discussion turned into Azriel’s privacy. 

She knows he is back tonight from a mission for Rhysand because the latter mentioned it at dinner, so he is surely awake (he is famously nocturnal, too, according to the others and his own words) but where, she is clueless.

Nibbling on her lower lip, Elain contemplates her options as the Sidra below her feet rolls in gentle soothing waves, the smooth crashing of waves on the bank voicing a sensible part of her brain that argues with her wishes.

“It’s fine,” she says, non-too confidently.

_It is inappropriate and intrusive._

“It isn’t when he gave me permission,” she works her fingers together. “He.. He said anytime, if I wanted to reach out, I could.”

_But finding him? That is disrespectful._

“How does he expect me otherwise?” already, the alert thought in her chest is rising to the challenging idea. “He probably doesn’t mind.”

_And if he does?_

“I’ll apologize most sincerely and back away,” with surety, she clenches her hands in fists and feels the resolute seeping in determinedly. “It is not a big issue. They’re very friendly with one another.”

_Are you with them? Is he?_

“Oh that’s something else completely,” Elain argues with her thoughts. “He will not mind… Will he?”

________

Half of a long hour later, Elain finds herself facing a closed door on the outskirts of the city, on the beach strip. The rustic beach house is a normal, white-stoned beach house, and it doesn’t strike her as anything special- perhaps the architecture of the house is expected it give that thought, what with her friend being infamously exhausted by the tribulations of his position and rare existence, perhaps what Azriel so sweetly craves is a sense of normalcy, like she does.

She raises her pale fist and knocks the bony surfaces of her knuckles on the door three clear times, lowers it to her side and waits.

She hopes she is right, and hopes to God she isn’t rousing a stranger from their sleep. Elain might wish to ease her unease, but not so at the expense of others who have no blame or cause.

Silent minutes later, she tries again and this time, her adjusted hearing sense picks up sounds of movement from inside and her insides begin to coil nervously vicious around each other. She’s definitely woken him up. Interrupted his well-deserved rest and stole it from him. Elain immediately feels horrible and her skin beings to inflict on her the torturous sensation of prickly spiders walking over her.

When the door opens and what little light from the moon illuminates Azriel’s figure, all thought is silenced from her head and her spindle of thought has been snipped off. As protocol, her lips smile from muscle memory, because the sight of Azriel warrants a happy smile.

“Welcome back,” she beams at his disheveled and bewildered state. Oh rats! She should have brought him something, like a flower or a treat- she feels more horrible somewhere, distinctly along the snipped wool of her intelligent thought.

Azriel’s eyes look from her then over her shoulder, and focuses on her and rubs them with a scarred thumb and index finger. He is barefoot, clad in a short sleeve cotton white shirt and matching white sleepwear shorts, his dark hair is standing all over in a manner that can only be styled by the running of hands through it, and he looks so off guard than he usually is.

“Elain. How did you get here?” he asks in a coarse struggling voice.

“I walked,” her voice trembles nervously in her throat. “I thought I’ll welcome you back.”

“It is two hours past midnight?”

“Oh my-!” intelligent thought once more finds its way through her numb mind once the initial shock of the changed environment sinks in and wears off. “Sorry! Were you sleeping?”

He stares blankly at her then pushes the door open to _his home_ , and steps aside. “Not anymore. Come in.”

“I’m so sorry,” she apologizes profusely, stepping over the threshold, inside _Azriel’s home_. “I- you said you are nocturnal, and I had the idea to see you. I didn’t think properly.”

She has gotten much better at voicing her thoughts into several genuine sentences rather than ones habitually said out of courtesy and upbringing, and she wishes it isn’t for an occasion like this, but she has brought this on herself.

“I know,” he said with a yawn stifled behind a hand, the other held out to receive her cloak. She sheds it and begins to take off her sandals, then painfully aware of her bare arms and her intimate appearance. Her nightgown is a long cotton dress that reaches her ankles and is by no chance intimate; Amren, Mor and Feyre wear more revealing attire, but it is the intimate thought of both their appearance that has Elain thinking she has gotten more than what she bargained for.

“But we were talking and I couldn’t help falling asleep.”

The plural pronoun he uses snaps Elain from her internal thought and a new kind of horror rolls through her blood. She has _not_ considered the possibility of him having company. By what rights does she, barely a friend, barge in on a personal night of companionship between Azriel and his partner? She is definitely the most horrible good person she knows for this- this crosses the line of inappropriate. This is rude intrusion.

So why is he inviting her in?

She follows his gestures into the house, hesitantly taking small steps while he hangs her cloak and leads her inside the snug rustic home. She is pleasantly surprised with the neatly kept interior, noticing the clutter everywhere but nothing out of place from rugs, collected items, hung paintings, furniture, the wooden floorboards and walls, the small kitchen space that is on her immediate right upon stepping inside, and couches decorated with pillows and cushions and throw-blankets, but what immediately attracts her attention is the airy feeling of the cramped space.

By no means is the space small, or cramped, but Elain is cocooned in a feeling akin to a warm blanket and it feels like an anxiety she does not have has been soothed. The main feature she glimpses of the floor they are on is the large balcony swallowing most of the space with large glass sliding doors and outdoor furniture. The thin curtains blow in the breeze coming in from the balcony with the crashing waves of the sea.

“Your home is beautiful,” she compliments in short lost words. She does not know how to describe the ease in her mind and soul, only that she feels at ease immediately. She has no words to describe it, but Azriel’s rustic home puts the pristine tasteful townhouse to shame.

“Thank you,” he replies softly, quietly moving on his bare feet towards the living space and couches, his wings relaxed on his back. This is an image she has never dreamt of before in her life, and it feels like she has stumbled into the life of someone that does not belong to her, like a curtain pushed apart and pushed through.

Then Elain notices the female on the large couches.

And every peaceful thought is blazed alight.

She does not make any move to acknowledge Elain’s presence, and she doesn’t know if she is expected to return the favor. She is still, curled in the corner of the couches taking a turn, facing the beautiful view and a blanket covering her is half off her lap.

The beautiful female makes no indication that there is a life beyond the sea’s siren songs, and the look in her eyes is of one enamored with a perfect thought they can never achieve, but still they chase. Her face is hauntingly beautiful; a faded beauty that remains, but mourns one once at its prime that made many hearts lust after, her eyes a deep hazel framed with the darkest of lashes, and her skin a tone that resembles Azriel and Cassian’s heritage- an Illyrian. Elain glimpses her wings at her back, folded so tightly never to be used, and something about her slim figure and slumped shoulders speaks something to Elain she can’t quite understand.

But what disturbingly crashes Elain’s heart and caves her chest in is the tender look on Azriel’s face, the loving care in his hands as he reaches for her blanket and fixes it on her, tucking it under her chin and over her shoulders, his ruined hands brushing the dark locks of her hair behind her ears then resting in her lap. He says something quietly in the tongue of an Illyrian tribe, and receives no answer instead Elain can perceive. He must have found an answer because he nods and turns his attention back to Elain.

“Elain,” he says softly and something about his features confuses Elain’s eyes. Perhaps she’s stared for long at the female that he looks alike her. “This is my mother. Elira.”

_Oh._

She can see it clearly- so, so clearly. What shared features between them one might pass as one shared between Azriel and Cassian and every other Illyrian stand out now clearly to her; the shape of the angular face, the shape of the eyes and beautiful haunting features of their faces. Now that she is looking for it, she can pin down a source of shared melancholy reminiscence in both their eyes.

“Oh,” she finds her voice saying, then she clears her throat. “Hello.”

His eyes dart to his mother whose gaze is fixed on the view before them, and makes no notion to move or acknowledge Elain.

“I’m sorry for intruding,” she feels properly terrible as she stands on the corner of the rug spread out under the couches in the living space. “I’ll leave-“

“It’s fine,” his lips curve slightly. “Have a seat. How did you find this place? No one knows about it.”

She winces as guilt spreads its wicked claws in her insides and digs them deep. She sinks in the couch on his side, his mother on his other. “I’m sorry for-for tracking you and wrecking your privacy- please forgive me.”

“Elain,” Azriel says in a gentle tone that matches the serenity of the house, so unalike his character; his cold characteristic tone, his brisk to-the-point behavior, and his quiet cut off nature. He truly is in his element here. “If I didn’t want you in, I wouldn’t have answered the door.”

Right- his shadows, knowing everything around him. That soothes her a little.

She’s definitely gotten more than she bargained for- but she can’t find it in herself to be upset about it.

“I used my gift,” she mumbles quietly. “It- the way you taught me.”

A stunned quiet look passes over his face and something like pride twinkles in his eyes and in the smile on his lips. “It worked?”

She nods, a blush thinking of forming on her cheeks. “Something small, but- it worked.”

“You know,” he says casually. “If you master this, you’ll hold the world’s future in your hands.”

“Good job not overwhelming me,” she whispers, fidgeting with her fingers in her lap. Recently, in her spare time Elain has found herself in the libraries more often, tracking down any book speaking of Seers and their gifts. Azriel joined her a week after she began, and found her a book on a Seer’s infamous powers one thousand and five hundred years ago, whom could –allegedly- envision something, and work their Seer gifts to make their vision a true event of the future. It was a dangerous tampering with the fates of the world, shutting curtains and opening some, and only one Seer was ever recorded to have the ability.

Azriel suggested Elain work on it, and so far it has worked thrice but how well they have Elain does not know. Mostly due to the fact that when she envisions a future and pours her powers and work into making it a vision, it’s centered around Azriel being safe and home from his missions. Elain doesn’t know if it is thanks to her gifts or because of his own skills. So how reliable her trick is, she has no idea, except finding him now confirms that she can achieve it if she concentrated _really_ hard and exhausts herself.

“What did you See?” he asks curiously. “To be able to find me.”

“I didn’t see, much more focus on feeling,” she replies quietly. “I felt very safe, and so did you. You were comfortable and at ease. I felt home. Everything felt homey.”

Azriel remains silent, his hand in his mother’s lap over her covered hands. He angles his head towards her, the softest of smiles blooming on his lips. “I know,” he murmurs softly to her.

Elain really wants to ask, but can’t bring herself to cross another line tonight. She has had enough of feeling horrible.

“Can I have some water, please?” she requests for her parched throat.

“Of course. Here.”

In the kitchen, Azriel finds her a glass of water and pours her some from a clay pot. The water is cool for the summer night, and sweet. A knowing look in his eyes, he pours her another drink when she asks for it.

“Mama makes the pots,” he says, leaning against the bar separating the kitchen space from the living one, while she savors the tasty water. She’s never tasted water that has a taste at all, much less like this sweet wholesome quenching of her thirst. “They cool the water and give it the taste. She loves making them. I don’t know how she does, but I’d fetch sea water and leave it in one for a day then come back to find it cool and sweet.”

“She must teach me her secret,” Elain mutters, striding to the sink and washing her glass.

“Elain…” his voice hesitates. “You can ask.”

She most certainly cannot and will not. “Maybe I can, maybe you’ll take my questions even if you don’t want to answer them. But I won’t ask. Not unless you want to tell me.”

His furrowed brow smooths over as a wave of relief washes over his normally closed-off face. “Thank you,” Azriel exhales hurriedly, his tight shoulders relaxing.

“I just want to know how to communicate with her, if I can,” she says quickly. “I don’t wish to be disrespectful.”

A corner of his lips turns up. “Normally. It’s her response you’ll have trouble with. But I’ll help.”

“Okay,” she smiles at him. His lips widen into the brightest smile of the night, brightest star in the sky, and he pulls out three new glass, then pours out of a covered pot a crystal-brown liquid into each.

“Something like apple juice but fermented,” he explains holding out one. “Mama’s camp makes it. It’s not strong- just twinges a bit.”

She follows him back to the living space where he sets his cup down and helps his mother drink from her glass. Taking a sip, Elain finds out it indeed sizzles in her mouth tastefully for a few seconds before it dissolves in a sweetened taste whose aftermath leaves behind a syrupy taste on her tongue.

“So,” he leans back in the couch, adjusting his wings against the worn cushions and swirling his drink in its glass held in his hand. “Why did you need to find me in the first place?”

Now that she thinks about it, she doesn’t know why, or the reason now feels so insignificant and small now that she’s achieved the goal of dismantling the loneliness swathing her. Elain looks at him, truly looks, and feels herself dissolving in this cocooning feeling of home, losing herself and any sense of her borders.

“Dreams,” her tongue says. “I couldn’t understand them. They upset me.”

His head rests on the couch’s back, eyes trained on her, the shape of them slanted and almost shut from the angle, a disarming aura he is displaying. He gulps down a mouthful of the tasty drink and Elain sips some more politely.

“Now?” he asks softly, drumming his fingers against the glass.

She looks away, down at her glass and the clear drink in it. “I think… that I understand them a bit more. They’re not visions. I think they’re my own dreams. My wishes.”

“Does that disappoint you?”

Her lips twitch. A faceless groom at the end of the flowery aisle, a bunch of white lilies in her hands, a white wedding dress with a long train, and the warmest tone of golden-bronze skin paired with smiling hazel eyes. “No. It’s liberating.”

“Good.”

The hour trickles by in lazy words and a cool warmth in her heart with the company kept. Azriel eventually curls up on the couch, resting his head in his mother’s lap, eyes open and fixed on Elain as she spoke, telling her about his own mission, but then his eyes began to inevitably slide shut and open again.

Azriel, for all his warrior strength and will power, absolutely melts in his mother’s touch when she brings out her hands and runs them in his lush dark hair. “Sūnús,” whispers Elira as she does so. “Sūnús.”

The happiest beautiful look is on his face and lips as she does and Elain thinks that he has never been more attractive. 

It is only a matter of seconds, and his eyelids remain shut over his eyes, leaving Elain sleepy herself smiling happily. Elira does not look away from her son as she says, almost like a prayer, “Sūnús.”

“Yes. He’s an amazing male,” Elain speaks with no filter. “You raised him well.”

Elira’s voice chokes over, and her eyes shine bright with tears though she refuses to look away from the apple of her eye. The tears drop on his head and she hastily brushes them from his hair. “Sūnús. Sūnús. Sūnús.”

“He’s amazing for what he’s been through, and for being this way still,” softly Elain speaks. “I admire him for it. He’s… remarkable.”

“Sūnús,” her tone is fonder now and her nimble fingers brush paths in his hair. Elain feels a moment of jealous, then quickly shakes the thought from her head.

Elain does not know how the night ends, or how it transactions into the morning. What she does know is that her eyes slightly open against the rising sun, and she’s sleeping against someone, a still sleeping arm around her and a moving stroking hand in her hair.

Elira’s hand runs in Elain’s hair too, along Azriel’s and now she’s whispering something else as she brushes Elain’s hair; “Dhugtēr.”

The Seer has no idea what it means, but Azriel is a nice sleeping buddy and he is warm and firm, and Elira’s gentle caressing hand in her hair sings her back to sleep. She has everything she wants.


	12. Saving an escaped kidnapped child

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I was going to post a horribly angsty one shot but then discovered that I have this. I totally forgot about it. Enjoy Elriel being Good Samaritan and Detective.

Elain leans against Azriel, comfortably finding the perfect planes of him to align with as she crosses one leg over the other and rests her book snugly in her lap. A faint spring breeze flutters by, blowing in her free hair gently. Azriel rests against the park bench as he exchanges texts with Cassian, occasionally a huff of laughter escapes him or a snort that quips Elain’s lips up in amusement.

The patter of small bare feet slapping against the path concreted in the park reaches her ears, and it’s the out of place rhythm of them that makes Elain glance up from her book. Her eyes land on a little boy dashing towards them, barefoot and filthy, his eyes wide and terrified. She frowns, shuts the book and straightens on the bench.

“Um, um, miss can you help me please?” he stops right in front of them, young voice hoarse and trembling as he sobs for breath. Azriel sharply looks up from his phone. “Um- I- I was with my mom and, and, and then a- a- a guy t-took me. He-He is chasing me-“

“What?” she sharply demands, reaching out to him, both of them leap instantly to their feet. “What guy? Are you okay?”

“Can you describe him?” asks Azriel.

“He-He’s tall and, and with a beard,” the boy stutters, inching closer to Elain. “And he-he has a gun. And a hamm-hammer.”

She meets Azriel’s gaze before he looks away around them. She pulls the shaking boy close to her, wrapping an arm around his quaking shoulders.

“There you are!” a rough voice growls. “Chris, why do you keep running away?”

They whirl around them to a lean white man rounding the park bench, heavily bearded and with scruffy hair. Elain dislikes the look in his eyes immediately and pushes the boy behind her when he reaches for him.

“Back off, man,” Azriel steps between his wife and the man, arms held out and his shoulders spread to straighten his figure and glower at the man.

“Gentleman and lady this is a misunderstanding,” he says easily with a smile, holding his hands out to the sides. “Chris’s my kid. He likes pulling pranks on me and running away.”

“This is your kid?” Azriel demands doubtfully, glancing at the black child clinging to Elain.

“Yes, he is. I adopted him,” the man ducks around Azriel to reach the terrified boy.

“Woah, woah, woah, BACK OFF!” roars Azriel as Elain snatches the boy away and steps back. “I said _BACK OFF_!”

“This really doesn’t concern you,” sneers the man, his face an ugly expression and a look which Elain can only describe as evil in his eyes chilling her blood.

“Kid’s terrified. Of course it does,” snarls Azriel.

“Is this man your adoptive father?” she asks the boy who has no words to say.

“Of course I am-“

“I was _not_ asking you,” she shoots him down immediately without looking away from the frozen stiff boy. “Look at me, you’re all right. Tell us, is this the man you were running away from?”

His brown eyes scream at her but his lips refuse to move, and he shakes so bad that it’s all the answer she and Azriel need. His grip on her jeans is tight and begging to be helped. She pulls him further away and behind her, meeting Azriel’s gaze for one fleeting moment and understanding sparks between them.

“He does this,” the kidnapper begins to explain before Azriel rounds on him.

“I need you to step back,” he states clearly. “Now, _pal_ -“

She sees the intention on his face before his hand moves. In a second she grabs the boy, hauls him off the floor and bolts away from them when he pulls out his gun in one fluid movement and screams at her to freeze, a gunshot echoes in the park missing Elain and rebounding off the concrete floor where it nicks her calf and she hears Azriel disarm him all in one small pocket of time.

She only stops when she hears a thud and the man’s sounds of animalistic resistance, yelling and screaming while Azriel pins him down on the floor, his knee dug in his back and locking his hands behind his back.

“You’re under arrest for kidnapping, attempted murder and having the nerve to tell me not to intervene,” he snarls in his ear, twisting his arms further into immobilizing him. “Anything you say will be held against you in the court of law, asshole. I can’t wait to have you rotting in jail.”

She meets his eyes and nods once, returning her gaze to the terrified boy in her arms. She sets him down on his feet and kneels before him as she reaches for her phone, quickly dialing Cassian.

“We have a situation,” she says quietly when her brother-in-law picks up immediately, resting her hand on the child’s bony elbow. “A man had kidnapped a boy and he escaped but the man chased him. Azriel’s holding him down now. We need help.”

“On it,” comes the crisp reply before he hangs up.

“You’re safe now,” she sets the phone down and takes both his hands in her own. She smiles warmly at him. “What’s your name? Chris?” He nods wordlessly. “Well, Chris, you’re safe now. He can’t harm you. See that man, my husband? He’s a detective and has the man who kidnapped you arrested. He can’t hurt you anymore. The police are on the way.”

“Stop moving,” she hears Azriel murmur dangerously. “I’ll pop your arms out of their sockets.” He strains the twisted arms for good measure and earns a shout of pain.

“B-Blood,” stutters the boy. “You have blood on your leg.”

“Huh?” Looking down reveals her pale jeans nicked in her calf, blood gushing in steady streams down her leg and what looks to be a small wound. Now that she acknowledges it, it begins to hurt a little.

“It’s all right,” she says as she shrugs off her jacket and puts it around his shoulders. “I’ll get my scarf. Hold on a moment.”

“You all right?” Azriel asks lowly when she limps to the bench. His eyes fall on the wound and go back to her eyes. She nods assuring. “Hand me something to tie him with.”

Azriel binds him tightly with her scarf, tucks his gun in his belt and removes a hammer off him while Elain keeps pressure on the small wound with his jacket and the boy Chris timidly sits at the bench by their possessions as they wait for the police. Cassian brings a whole team with him, an ambulance and Child Services, and is more than happy to haul off the kidnapper into a car while a medical team fusses over Elain’s leg and Chris.

“I’m fine, honestly,” she says while they clean her leg and she holds Azriel’s hand. She looks to her husband and repeats her statement.

“It’s superficial,” they’re informed. “Needs stitching and wrapping up.”

She smiles at his face. “Good job with the arrest,” she compliments softly. “Is it invalid because you’re off duty?”

“Nah,” he shrugs. “Besides, Cassian has it handled. Good thinking on your part keeping the boy away.”

“Well,” she bumps her shoulder with his. “Teamwork makes the dream work.”

“Nice weekend, this one,” he muses, rubbing his thumb over her hand while her leg is stitched up. “Though I didn’t have this in mind for a Sunday afternoon. I should treat you for being a Good Samaritan.”

“We saved a life,” she replies happily. “Oh, let’s get some ice cream. I’m dying for some.”

“It’s still chilly,” he notes, keeping eye contact as a wince passes over her face from the stitching that soon comes to an end. “You sure?”

“Ice cream in this weather is perfect, you know,” she relaxes the sudden tight grip on his hand and leans closer to him. “And we can have a cuddle to warm up later.”

“Anything you say. What do you say we pick up an ice cream cake too on the way home?”

“You are perfect, I’m glad I married you. And to that I say, the more the merrier.”


	13. Unbowed, unbent, unbroken

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Azriel gives up something precious to keep his Seer alive.

Elain’s visions were ruthless when they came to her during the day; they were akin to torture and terror manifesting in the Seer’s mind and heart. Azriel never heard Elain indicate being in pain, but he thought that it had to be something related to the fact that when they come, she’s not in her own conscious body.

She said they usually came in the night, which made his job in helping her easier- most of his work took place at night and if his shadows sensed turmoil coming from his wife he was back home before whoever he was with could notice him gone. Rarely did she ever have her visions while she was awake, and when she did she mostly could handle it.

Not recently, though.

The first time it happened, Azriel was coming home and immediately smelled blood.

Elain was in the garden, handling sharp gardening tools and a knife when her eyes glazed over and she froze- Elain became as stiff as a wooden board and was about as paralyzed as she was when her mind wakes before her body; her fist clenching tightly around the blade so hard it dug deep into her hand and spilt blood over her pure white roses. It was a lucky thing Azriel was home; a moment later and Elain’s grasp would have cut off her hand or had it badly mangled to be amputated.

The second time, she was in the bathroom and he in their bedroom settling in for the night when he heard the unmistakable crash and a thud of a fallen body. Elain’s frame had toppled over when the vision came to her in the middle of brushing her teeth and her head had banged against the tub’s edge hard enough to draw blood and knock her out. When she came to, she was ash faced and shaken and burst into soft tears.

The third time it happened, it was on Winter Solstice and he was just giving her his gift. Their family eagerly awaited to see the shadowsinger’s gift for his fawn as Elain unwrapped the parcel, her face brightening up in a smile at the new sunhat when her entire face froze over, her happy expression dropped and she collapsed, limp this time too, against the back of the couch and sent everyone into an uproar.

Azriel was in tears by then as he cradled her, despising being ignorant to what so obviously plagued his wife and was helpless against it. When Elain’s body reawakened, she took one look at him, her eyes so sorrowful there weren’t tears to amount to the emotion, and her face crumbled into despair. Since then, Amren had been hunting down a reason behind Elain’s condition, her weakened frame and physique, joined by Azriel’s shadows and himself as he hunted book after book in the libraries of the Night Court. Elain was given a potion by Madgia to take regularly, but whatever it was seemed to make the matter worse as Azriel found himself bolting to their bedroom night after night due to Elain’s strangled screams.

It was like she was wilting away, so alike her precious flowers. She didn’t understand what was going on either, because after a vision she’d clutch his arm in a death grip and whisper in a tight voice how this shouldn’t be happening. Azriel couldn’t shake off the look she kept sending his wings after her visions, something terrified in her expression as she regarded them before burying her face in his shoulder. Day by passing day, Elain withered, became fainter, thinner and sicker.

A few weeks later, Amren concocted a likely explanation as to why Elain’s visions were taking a turn.

“The things you’re seeing aren’t your gifts,” she explained sharply to them in the House of Wind. Azriel frowned. “They’re your nightmares that you’re making into visions. Do you wake up paralyzed from sleep?”

Elain’s face blanched while they collectively all raised a similar eyebrow of scepticism. Elain hesitantly nodded.

“Explains why you can’t move,” Amren shrugged and took a sip of her wine without tasting it as her eyes jumped from one spot on Elain’s face to another- studying her, Azriel realized, trying to figure her out.

“That doesn’t sound-“ Rhys began doubtfully.

“It’s what I came up with.”

“How do we treat this?” asked Azriel, crossing his arms as he leaned against Elain’s chair. “Why now?”

“You’ve seen something,” Amren spoke softly to Elain who wouldn’t meet anyone’s eyes. “It scares you.”

“What did you see, Elain?” Feyre asked eagerly, a touch worried. Elain kept her gaze averted as Azriel looked down at her silently; a slow steady current of a thought was rallying up in his head and he didn’t want to think about it, but he thought to the first time this happened. Elain had refused to say what she saw and he hadn’t pressed her then, more concerned about the physical harm done to herself. But when he thought about it, two things stuck out in his mind like a sore thumb.

One; when Elain gets paralyzed, she can’t move a muscle- he would know, because when he soothes her on the nights her mind wakes up before her body, she’s limp in his hands like a rag doll and can’t move to save her life. How had she managed to cut herself that day in the garden, then? Azriel straightened sharply, his hazel eyes wide and attentive as he looked down at Elain in a new light who found the floor more interesting than the conversation they were having. He thought to the night she fell in the bathroom: she’d been properly paralyzed then when he carried her. The third time she collapsed against the couch and her head had rolled onto Cassian’s shoulder.

Two, the time in the garden when she came to as he was administering the basic aid to her hand, her face had twisted into an expression of horror as she took him in. He’d shaken it off- her colorless face and her mortified expression as an aftermath of her vision. Now, he started to doubt himself.

Elain hadn’t gone paralyzed from her vision, Elain had frozen from the onslaught of emotions on her. Which meant- which meant-

“Elain,” he said softly but firmly and Elain flinched. “Why did you hurt yourself that day in the garden?”

Rhys stilled by the open archways, and Feyre gaped at the couple. Cassian never looked as serious as this from his perch on the dining table with Nesta close by looking ready to jump into action- any action. Mor hovered by Azriel’s side in concern and gasped when he asked his question.

“You said it was an accident,” Feyre demanded, her bright eyes darting to Elain’s right hand clenched into a tight fist in her lap.

“I thought it was,” Azriel responded, getting down on his knees before Elain. “Love,” he took her hands and his tone implored her to look at him. “If I hadn’t come you would have lost your hand. Why did you do it? Why?”

Elain met his eyes with bright brown ones tearing up. She pursed her lips and shook her head as her shoulders quivered and she trembled to hold back a sob in her chest. Eventually they escaped her and she burst into ugly heart wrenching broken sobs as she looked at him. Azriel had never heard a sound like that except from Feyre when Rhys died, and from Rhys’s father when his wife died-

He blanched.

“Elain,” he breathed faintly, reaching to cup her cheek. “Did you see me die?”

The legs of Nesta’s chair screeched unforgivingly against the surface as she abruptly stood and marched towards them. “Leave her alone,” she snapped at Azriel and took Elain by the shoulders. “Leave her the fuck alone,” Nesta repeated. It only made Elain cry even more.

“Amren,” Feyre spoke up difficultly. “What do we do? To stop her-“

“If what Azriel says is true,” Amren spoke lightly- too lightly. “If Elain hurt herself on purpose then her Fae magic has rallied up against her to prevent her from further harming herself. It explains her unconsciousness. Whatever she sees drives her to hurt herself and her powers subconsciously rally against her.”

Azriel smoothed his hands over Elain’s knees who sobbed and sniffled. “Elain, this is like everything else,” he spoke gently. “Like every other vision you’ve had. You tell us, we work around it. Like we always do. Nothing you see must drive you to hurt yourself. Tell me.”

“N-No,” she spoke, her voice high pitched and breaking as her chest shuddered. “I’ve tried. It won’t change. I can’t stop it.”

Nesta shot him a murderous glare as she hugged Elain- Elain who clung to his scarred hands like they were her lifeline, who held onto him tightly as she cried. Elain, who was scaring the shit out of him.

“Tell us,” Mor said gently. “Like Azriel said. It can’t be one person’s sole effort, Elain. It never is, no matter what Rhys teaches you through his actions. We always solve things together.”

“You can’t,” Elain choked. “You can’t.”

“What did you _see_?” Feyre pressed.

“Enough!” Nesta snapped like a crack of the whip. “Leave her _alone_.”

But Azriel was shooting to his feet when Elain’s grasp on his hands went limp and she was motionless in Nesta’s arms. Her head rolled back on the chair’s back and her eyes were glazed over.

“Fuck!” Feyre kicked over a chair.

“You’ll need a witch,” Amren said quietly. Azriel, Rhys and Cassian turned to her for details. “Try Helion’s Court. A witch can break Elain’s magic over herself.”

“Why not Helion himself?” Rhys asked but Azriel was already bolting through the room to the doors.

“This isn’t work for a High Lord. You need a witch.”

Witches were rare in Pryhtian, especially this time; and even rarer was to find one willing to help you without a price or even willing to help you at all. They hid themselves in their caves and their spells and came out when they needed to. Azriel never trusted them a day in his life but had to admit they were useful. There were a few occasions they had to find a witch, and rare had the occasion ended well enough. There was always a price. A high one to pay.

It took him two days to find one. And this one’s price was the worst.

She wanted nothing.

Not immediately, anyway. When Azriel presented his case, she eyed him wickedly with cunning in her eyes and agreed on the condition of an unnamed price. Azriel agreed after he ranted off the usual, basic conditions when dealing with a witch: _you cannot have my firstborn or any child I bear, nor my life or anyone I know, you cannot have years from my life, you cannot have that which I can never possibly achieve_ along with the rest of the page-long conditions. She was the worst, because she agreed and Azriel couldn’t think of her required price.

He took her to his house where his family was gathered with an unconscious Elain, waiting for their arrival. Azriel welcomed her into his house on the very carefully worded conditions one with common sense had to say before inviting anything into their house.

She took one look at Elain in the room, examined her for a few minutes in silence without moving then came out to the living space and announced what she needed.

“I need something precious,” she explained to the fae present. Rhys frowned. “The Seer is Made, and by that something precious was taken from the Cauldron. The Seer’s powers cannot be balanced without something precious being offered in return.”

Feyre stood up, her hand yanking off the necklace around her neck without a second thought and held it to the witch who shook her head. The necklace was priceless, of the most precious gems the Night Court could produce, and it was special to Feyre for being a gift from Rhys on the day they held the celebration of their wedding. Azriel hadn’t seen her ever take it off before.

“Why not? Is it required from each of us?” asked Feyre. Before the witch can answer, Cassian was dislodging the Siphons on his hands and placing them in Feyre’s hand to join her necklace. Mor stepped up too with him, taking off her signature golden bands (Azriel knew they were magical, kept her alive and healthy and unharmed more than they were decorative) and placing them with Feyre. His family’s concern and willing to give away precious things to them for his wife would have touched Azriel any day, but he was preoccupied with thoughts of his wife.

When Rhys stepped forward, the witch shook her head. “No. Something far more precious. And it cannot come from you but the one the Seer has bound herself to, in life and in death.”

Eyes swivelled to him as he stood still.

His hand grazed Truth Teller at his hip, briefly wondering if he can hand it over to the witch- there is a very good reason no one but him had touched the blade in his possession. Truth Teller, in the wrong hands (which were all hands in the world), could wreak more havoc than a mind could comprehend; it didn’t just cleave the honest from the deceiver or the truth from the lie, but it also summoned the wicked dead, opened up the gates of Hell and the shadowlands until every single shadow was an open portal for the Otherworldians to travel through. He had been to the shadowlands himself, had dived deep into that realm since his boyhood before he braved the common realm of theirs, and had known monsters before he knew Fae and humans.

The witch’s lips curled. “No. Though it is a worthy price to pay, I will say.”

He stared quietly at her as everyone did at him and he thought of what he could give to save Elain from her powers and her imminent death should this continue. Precious. What is most precious to him? Elain, undoubtedly. TruthTeller. His mother. His brothers. But he couldn’t give away any of them.

Azriel was about to ask what she wanted when his thoughts jumped to the time in the garden. Elain had almost cut off her hand before he intervened- her right hand; the one she gardened with, the one she worked on everything with, the one she used to touch him and love him, the hand that she relied on to live, cook, create, garden, sew.

The most precious thing to her.

His heart sank.

She was offering the most precious thing of her up.

His breath quickened and his chest tightened, his suspicions confirmed when the witch’s smile turned sinister and dark. Elain hadn’t seen him die- Elain had seen him offer up the most precious part of him-

His wings.

“Az?” Mor stalked to him when he stopped breathing. “Az, what is it? You’re going to faint. Breathe. Azriel-“

“No,” he chocked in a tone that had never escaped him before a day in his life. The witch nodded. Cassian approached him.

“Something precious was taken, something precious must be offered.”

“I _can’t_ …” he whispered softly. _His wings?_ How many Illyrian was that the ultimate nightmare of?

Answer: every single one.

“You will have to lose something today. You only have the choice to choose what.”

“Az?” Cassian grasped his shoulder gruffly in an attempt to yank Azriel back to his senses. “What is she talking about?”

He kept staring at the witch, his mouth dry, his chest hollow, his body shutting down. Elain or his wings? Elain or his wings?

The worst part about the question was that he couldn’t find an answer to it. He couldn’t choose because who in their right mind would? His wife or his wings? His life either way. What choice was that?

Something precious.

Elain was more than precious. Elain was everything to him; Elain was the reason he found it in himself to greet the day bravely. Elain was why he did what he did. Elain was the one person who could hold Truth Teller. Elain was the whole world. Elain steals those smiles and lovestruck grins from him. Elain made his life happier, brighter like no one before her managed.

But his wings. _He_ is his wings. Without them he is nothing. He amounted to nothing. His life depended on those wings. His wings-

“I’ve always been told an Illyrian’s strength lies in their wings,” the witch said. “I’d like to see that for myself.”

“What the _fuck_?” Cassian demanded vulgarly as Mor sharply gasped. “You want his _wings_?!”

“I want nothing,” the witch replied sagely, her eyes alight with sadistic joy. “Something precious has been taken. Something precious must be given.”

“You can’t-“

Azriel clenched his teeth so tight they threatened to break. _Unbowed, unbent, unbroken_ , he repeated in his head. _Unbowed, unbent, unbroken_. He will not break, will not bend, and will remain strong and standing. “Fine,” he said soundlessly through flared nostrils. Cassian rioted while Rhys began shouting at him.

“Are you out of your _mind?!?_ ”

“You’re not fucking serious-”

“Az, these are your _wings_!”

Azriel shrugged off Cassian’s tight grip, an ugly snarl twisting his lips as he walked towards the witch. His hands were clenched so tightly that his fingernails dug deep into his palms, breaking skin and drawing blood- not that he can feel any of it. Cassian began shouting at the top of his lungs when Azriel knelt on the carpeted ground before the witch, unfolding his wings shakily and spreading them apart. He gritted his jaw as his lower torso quivered and his hands shook. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t keep his body from unwillingly shaking.

“Az, don’t do this-“ Feyre whispered distraughtly but he ignored her as he unbuttoned the top buttons of his snugly fitting jacket and shrugged it off, his wings mindlessly twisting in coordination with his arms to slip out of the slits fashioned for them. Feyre reached out to stop him but didn’t dare touch him, her eyes haunted with something she’d seen before. “Az, you’ll die.”

 _Unbowed, unbent, unbroken_ , he thought in his mind as he grasped the hem of his sweatshirt and peeled it off his body too. His hands were shaking as he tossed the clothing away and knelt before the witch bare. He knew pain, and fear. Knew pain at its utmost state, had delivered it to numberless masses while suffering it himself. He knew pain in all its forms.

And was petrified of it.

The witch stood tranquil before him as he tried to keep himself together. She took in every jumping of his muscles, the nervous twitch of them, the clench of his jaw and his fists planted in the floor at his sides. He thought of Elain, pale and sickly and hurting herself to alleviate this outcome; to prevent him from losing his wings. He felt some resolve seep in and he drew his strength from it.

Then he thought of his wings and he nearly burst into tears as fear grasped his heart once more.

“Do it,” he gasped in a strangled voice. “Take them.”

“You can’t!” Cassian shouted. “Azriel you’re signing your fucking death-“

“Azriel listen to me,” Rhys crouched next to him, his face stricken with seriousness and a grimness in his face. Rhys looked close to losing his composure and succumb to traumatized panic and memories. “You’re an Illyrian first before _anything_. Losing them, you lose what you’ve built all these centuries-“

“I’m not an Illyrian. And I _know._ I lived eleven years without them,” Azriel snarled as his torso twitched against his will. “I’ll live some more.”

“Azriel this is _not_ the same-“

“You can’t take them from him!” Cassian roared at the witch, Nesta holding him back by the arms, her heels planted into the floor. “Oh, fuck it! _Take mine_!”

The witch shook her head. “They must be given and taken unwillingly from whom the Seer has bound herself to.”

“He’s offering them on a silver fucking platter,” snarled Rhys up at the witch.

“He is unwilling to give them,” she replied, her eyes trained on Azriel’s stony expression. “He does not wish to give them up. But he will.”

“I’ve seen Fae die losing their wings,” Feyre spoke in a trembling voice. “Azriel’s whole life-“

“DO IT!” roared Azriel, at his wit’s end. _Un-fucking-bowed. Un-fucking-bent. Un-fucking-broken_. He’s pulled himself through nearly six centuries. He’ll pull himself through for the rest of eternity. That’s right, as long as he has Elain. He’ll make it through.

Why did he not believe that?

“Hold him,” the witch commanded Rhys and Cassian as she circled around to his back in slow precise steps. “Don’t let him fight back.”

The words, the steps, the atmosphere- oh fuck, he was really doing this. He cleared his head of any thought, any feeling and told himself this had to be done. This needed to be done. For no reason. He just had to have his wings sawed off. It was needed. He could do this.

“Rhys stay away from my mind,” Azriel requested as Rhys swallowed difficultly and grasped his shoulder and right arm. Azriel struggled to keep his wings spread apart wide and still as they twitched as if knowing their condemned fate. Cassian knelt on his other side and grasped his left arm and shoulder, his eyes wide and close to panic.

“Give me your belt,” Azriel bade softly. Cassian looked close to being sick as he undid the belt around his waist holding his accessory weapons. The sound of the knives clattering to the ground as he swiped them off his belt almost made Azriel flinch and snap but he held firm and he stood his mental ground. Rhys rubbed his hand over Azriel’s bare shoulder and arm, attempting at soothing frayed nerves and failing.

Cassian folded his belt in two and placed it between Azriel’s teeth who clenched down on it. Azriel knew pain since birth, was well acquainted with it in the dark and the roaring of the fire set to his hands, was beaten into it in the camps. He’d stand firm.

But why wasn’t the thought of Elain soothing him?

The terrible truth is, in this panic he couldn’t conjure a single good thought or memory with his wife. Couldn’t think of her at all. Or their dog and cat. Couldn’t think it was worth this –his _wings_ , he moaned sorrowfully. He shook in Rhys and Cassian’s arms, relying on them to hold him firm and steady while the witch selected a large knife from Cassian’s discarded weapons. Azriel swallowed thickly, nearly swallowed his tongue too, and struggled to contain this panicking power in him, banging at the walls to be let out, frantic and paranoid and so terrified.

Azriel had the sudden horrible thought that he would manage without Elain but he couldn’t manage without his wings- he’d be devastated, heartbroken, driven mad with grief, yes, but still fucking _alive_ and physically whole. Not mutilated. Not broken.

 _Un-fucking-broken_ , a part of him snarled violently in his mind at his panicking conscious.

No, no, no, the rest of him raged. No woman was worth this. No woman was worth carving himself out-

“Wait-“ he chocked out through the belt but was too late; the witch took his right wing at the base in her startlingly cold hand, grasped it in a chocking tight grip and put the knife to its base, even as the wing raged with a mind of its own and fought to be released; the sharp knife slid smoothly into the membrane and cut through.

Azriel screamed.

Once in his long life while serving Rhysand’s father as his friends were separated from him, he’d caught a winged fae through his spies sent by Amarantha to infiltrate the court and assassinate the High Lord of the Night. The moment the fae set foot into the Night court territory, Azriel’s shadows, still youthful and untested and eager to prove themselves, picked up his intentions immediately and led Azriel to him.

Rhysand’s father had him interrogate him, instead of rummaging through his mind himself he had Azriel torture every word out of his lips; Azriel at one point had used potions that scorched his throat and stomach, some that burned his lips into a crisp, others that grasped his mind and drove him mad. The fae had screamed for days.

In the end when there was nothing left to be said, Rhysand’s father told him to take what was most precious to the fae. So Azriel had wielded Truth-Teller again and shredded his first wings before he cut them off.

All the torture the fae had undergone, and he’d never screamed as loud as he had when he lost his wings.

Azriel bellowed just as loud.

Rhys and Cassian buckled against him as he fought to push them off. The more he moved, the more his back and spine curved and shied from the knife, the deeper it went and the harder he screamed.

The witch hacked at the thick base of his wing, like sawing off a branch off a tree and he _screamed_. Pain was an understatement; Azriel was going feral with madness from it. White clouded his vision as he bit down on the leather and his tongue, drawing blood from his mouth as he screamed and buckled and twisted and his brothers held him down.

He could feel the knife keenly hack at the muscles in his wing, slice off connective tissue and cartilage like it was nothing until it stopped and his wing dropped to the floor, an ugly splashing sound following as it collapsed into a pool of his blood. He felt it twitching with last signs of life, the edge tickling his lower back painted red with his blood.

Someone was crying, he realized. Someone was crying and sobbing so bad he could feel the sobs tear through his vocal cords and his chest cave in with the weight. It was him; screaming and crying for the first time in his life.

Rhys was speaking nonsense in his ear as one would to a spooked animal, running his hand over Azriel’s arm over and over again, holding down Azriel’s head to his shoulder and keeping his own on top of Azriel’s as the torture commenced. He kept talking but Azriel couldn’t hear anything.

“ _Unbowed!_ ” Azriel sobbed unintelligibly through the muffling gag but still screamed it as loud as possible while tears pooled down his twisted face. “ _Unbent! Unbroken!_ ”

The witch murmured something, her hand over the bare flesh where his wing once was, then she moved to start on the left wing, flapping widely and frantically trying to escape the fate of its twin.

Azriel screamed like he had never before, felt the air cut off from his brain, felt his blood rush from his body, soak his skin and the floor and carpet; and Cassian and Rhys. He screamed, going mad with pain, until his second wing dropped, a dead carcass to the floor.

He stared at the wall of the living space as he cried, shifting his muscles in his back but feeling nothing but the keen absence of his lifeline, his wings, his limbs. He spasmed in his brothers’ grasp, then his muscles relaxed without warning and Azriel was toppling forward without the grounding weight at his back, toppling into another world.

__________________

Feyre sat vigil by her brother-in-law and sister’s unconscious bodies. She sat there all through the night and day, and then some more while healers were brought for Azriel and dismissed. She was loath to bring so many strangers into their house, preferring to have them in her own and preserving this sanctuary for the couple but after the afternoon’s events, no one was ready to look, so much as touch, at Azriel’s face.

She was too traumatized by his screams, the pure anguish and the panic in his voice haunted her thoughts. There was too much blood- his whole back was a sea of red paint glistening on his muscles, the flesh left behind by his wings an ugly deep purple and magenta mash of gruesomeness. Every time she thought about it, she was visited by the urge to hurl up her insides. Cassian had done that three times since Azriel passed out, and Rhys was locked in the bathroom hurling his guts up.

Azriel had collapsed, leaving the house in a loud eerie silence as the witch gathered his wings and folded them, then asked for a butcher. Feyre couldn’t ask her what she wanted him for, but Amren and an ash-faced Mor went with her. The thought of the butcher slicing up her friend’s wings, chopping them up and skinning them like she used to the animals she hunted made her feel more than sick to the bone.

She sat in her chair by Elain’s side, watching them both slumber. She had the terrible feeling in her heart that maybe her sister didn’t deserve Azriel but shook the thought out violently as soon as it came. Elain was hacking off her own hand by the time Azriel found her. They deserved each other, but not this- this gruesomeness.

Someone, somewhere in Velaris was now chopping up Azriel’s wings into tiny bits. She focused on keeping her organs down where they belonged.

She heard Rhys heave in the bathroom.

Elain’s face was sickly and pale and Feyre was frantic on the witch and Amren coming back to rid them of this mess as soon as possible. Azriel’s face was a mystic horror of its own as his limp body was laid on his front, bare torso washed and bandaged in attempts to seal the massive wounds in his back but never dreaming of doing so to the ones in his heart.

Something darkened his face; something literally under his skin. As if his shadows had seeped in there to make up for the blood loss. Occasionally the shadows around him would shift, giving her the illusion that he moved while he remained still. Feyre was assured by more than one healer her friend would survive; physically, his build body strength could recover from this trauma after a long twisted road. No one answered her about his mind’s recovery; she contemplated going into his mind and sorting through the memories to erase and manipulate every thought he had of the missed wings, and green as she was with her talents, Feyre couldn’t hope to do something so violating- take them from his mind as well as his body.

When Amren came back with a squeamish looking Mor, she held a steaming goblet in her hands. Feyre took one look at Mor helping Elain’s head up as Amren settled next to her, placing the goblet’s rim to her lips and she bolted from the room, acid and bile and horror rising through her.

She skidded next to Rhys on the floor of the bathroom and hurled them up into the toilet. Rhys took one look at her expression, then dry heaved.

___________________________

Azriel stirred the next morning. He opened bleary eyes and felt incredibly exhausted in a way he hadn’t felt in ages. He felt oddly light as he laid on his front and pushed himself up on his arms, crying out sharply at the searing pain in his back before he dropped onto the mattress.

Unbelieving, his hands unfeeling as they were reached back and traced thick bandages wrapped around his torso and back and felt nothing but a lump landmark where his wings once were.

His face twisted in disbelief as horror replaced his blood. Tears pooled at his eyes and fell onto the pillow beneath his head. A sniffle sounded to his left- he numbly turned his head towards the source and found Elain seated on her side of the bed, eyes puffy and nose red.

“Ellie,” he mumbled in hoarse horror, reaching for her. “They’re- _gone_.”

Elain burst into tears, bowed over on the mattress, her hair pooling around her and over his arm. She howled. Azriel cried silently. Not quite believing it either.


	14. Of Snickers bars and coffee

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Elriel at the gym, modern AU

Elain wasn’t a fit person by any stretch. 

She hadn’t a reason to be, in her defence, her job as part of the IT department required minimal physical fitness, and elevators and escalators were invented for the purposes of avoiding the devil’s work that people called stairs. And she lived in the second floor of her apartment building and used public transportation to go about. To top it off, her love of pastries and baked goodies meant she wasn’t quite ready to pay mind to her calorie intake or be bothered to count them. 

She tried to remedy the lack of fitness by walking to the bakery and other nearby facilities. She even had the idea of starting to walk to work, but quickly discarded the idea after one time where five minutes into her walk she had realised that a) she was going to be late, b) she was sweating and heaving for breath too much, and c) the path to work was extremely shorter when one was taking a vehicle there. 

Elain could just not understand people like her friend, Clare, who would get up at the crack of dawn for a run before work, take the stairs instead of any other alternative, walk the numerous trips in one’s day and have a life of planned meals and healthy eating. Elain thought about dieting, like Clare once did, but just could not give up croissants on her coffee break for granola bars. 

That is not to say Elain is a picky eater or that she prefers junk food. Elain likes all food. That’s her problem. That, and her job does not need being in shape- only her brain to be sharp. No one said anything about being able to run laps or do push-ups. That, too, is also not to say Elain doesn’t like being active. She loves to play games like badminton and Burglars and The Police (that had been one of her favorite games in school. She loved being the burglar). She loves to run, play games and swim. She just can’t last two minutes without her rib cage threatening to cave in on her chest or her sides straining sharply like a pair of tights that don’t fit. 

It was all fine and dandy for her, until it got bad enough to the point that when the elevator was out of order and she had to take the stairs with Clare, she collapsed on the ground clutching her sides after climbing four floors, wheezing about how life can go on without her, she’ll be fine her yes thank you, leave her to die in peace.

Clare had talked her into signing up to a gym and working on getting back in shape. Her friend suggested a gym who recently was offering a membership with a discount for a month. What’s the harm in trying it out, Clare had asked. Sipping a glass of orange juice, Elain agreed. 

Now, she was no idiot. Before going on her first day to the gym, she had went online and scavenged the internet on the Dos and Donts of gym-going. She watched comedy sketches that identified the types of people one would see at the gym, in order to avoid being the dumbest person there and mentally preparing herself for what she was to witness. It was a lot like going to middle school, listening to Nesta instruct her and what to do and what to avoid. By the time the video about a workout for beginners finished, Elain looked up from her laptop at the time and shut down the device when it was a late 1:03am. Her cat was snoring in her lap. 

When she arrived at the gym, she immediately felt out of place. Sure, she’d gone and online shopped for matching cute gym shirts and yoga pants and a new headband and a brand new water bottle and a new wristwatch to keep her motivated. But looking around the large gym, filled with people already into their respective beast modes going at the machines that Elain had absolutely no name for, she was ready to turn on her heel and to leave.

No! She had promised herself to go back into shape and the gym was the best place for it. She promised herself a cinnamon roll after this, and the thought of the pastry was enough to make her walk into the gym and sign up for a membership. 

Now. Elain walked in with whole categories of people to sort into for fun. There was The Screamer already spotted, The Light Sweater at one of those machines you had to pull, The Talkative Timmy (she made a mental note to avoid him) and the Heavy Sweater. Elain was armed with the knowledge of the kinds of people that frequent gyms, and was thoroughly educated about the gym now.

What YouTube videos failed to mention was the idiot who forgot their water. Naturally, Elain was such a person. 

The safest option to start with is the treadmill, so she had approached the machines lined up before a set of windows and timidly got on one, most comfortable with starting her workout with running. 

Five minutes later of light jogging, Elain was beginning to feel good about herself. The Singer type was running next to her on the nearby treadmill, loudly singing to a rock band Elain hadn’t heard of. But the girl was funny so Elain did not comment on her loud singing. 

Six minutes in, a fellow gym-goer stepped on the treadmill which Singer abandoned after two minutes in (Elain was very grateful) and began running. 

Elain glanced at him out of the corner of her eye as he walked for a few seconds then sped it up to full running. She was curious to the stereotype he would fit in, and Elain contemplated sorting him in the Heavy Sprinter category. He was running fast. 

Not wanting to be The Creep, she didn’t look again and kept her steady light pace of running. She was doing good, for a first timer. Ten minutes later, she looked around for that cycling machine that had looked like fun to use. She wanted to try that one. Really, the only two machines that she had in mind to use where the treadmill and that cycling machine. 

Sweating, she stepped off the treadmill and stood on the tips of her toes to locate it. She spotted Mr How Many Sets Are You Doing screaming the question at an innocent bystander, then she found The Creep. 

Staring at her. 

She quickly looked away, her hand shooting up to her ponytail nervously. The Creep wouldn’t look away when she glanced at him again, so she quickly got on the treadmill again and started it once again. If Heavy Sprinter noticed her quick return, he made no mention of it. Ignored her even. 

Elain ran for a solid minute before The Creep appeared at her shoulder with a “Hey, girl”. She visibly startled and jumped, loosing her pace on the quick treadmill and stumbling on it. Her legs couldn’t keep up with the lost rhythm. She latched onto the treadmill handle as her legs ran, bending and crouching, loosing control and almost tripping onto it.

For one terrifying moment, her face came too close to the hasty rolling tape, and she screwed her eyes shut as she tried to pull herself out of imminent injury when someone yanked her off the fast machine and switched it off with the emergency red button she should have used. 

Stumbling to stand straight, her eyes flew open while someone holding her steadied her on the floor, safely away from the treadmill. Her heart was racing and The Creep was nowhere to be seen. 

“You all right?” A smooth deep voice asked from her side. She met the eyes of her savior, a hazel pair of beautiful mixing colours, coloured with concern as they stared straight into her soul and thought-

_Oh no **.**_

__

The man who had been running on the treadmill next to her was staring at her face, brow furrowed and eyebrows low over his eyes. Beautiful. He was beautiful. Devastatingly. Elain panted, mouth dry and sticky and stared back at him. 

Then, the Idiot Who Forgot Their Water promptly fainted.

——

She came to what felt like a second later, to stare up at an office ceiling- _oh thank God, it was all a bad dream. She’d never go to a gym. She was dozing off at work_ before murmured voices made her actually think. 

Someone was supporting her head, her legs were propped up high on the edge of a chair, and she was in her brand new gym clothes, her legs positively screaming. The arm beneath her head was steady and the rim of a bottle was held to her lips, cool water lightly sloshing into her dry mouth. 

She almost surged up to drink all the cool water, hand darting to the bottle to drink more and someone withdrawing it slightly with a warning “careful”. 

Standing over her was a stranger of a brown colouring, black hair bound in a bun and observing her keenly. Then she looked to the person supporting her and helping her drink. 

Mr Heavy Devastatingly Handsome Sprinter. 

She coughed, almost a choke and he set down the bottle, lowering her head back to the floor. 

“What-?” She began to ask, slightly confused and disoriented and frankly, a little scared. “What?”

“Dehydrated,” he answered. 

“Lack of sugar,” piped up the other guy. She rubbed her eyes. She hadn’t eaten anything this morning before going to the gym. What an idiot. 

“How long?” She tried to sit up.

“Stay still for a little,” the handsome stranger said. “Five minutes. Cassian put in a sugar solution in the water” he held the wrapper before her eyes to see. “I’m Azriel.”

“Elain,” she grumbled, embarrassed. “I forgot my water at home.”

“First timer?” Asked Cassian. She hummed affirmatively.

“Eat this when you feel like getting up,” Azriel pressed a bar of chocolate in her palm. “Or just call it a day and go home.”

“Don’t tempt me,” she mumbled, thinking of the promised cinnamon roll. “I’m trying to get fit.”

“You should have signed up for a class,” Cassian sounded amused as he spoke. “Instead of braving the wild alone.”

“What are you, The Fanatic Instructor?” She said without thinking. Azriel laughed. 

“Yeah, he is. He gives a class here.”

“Aha, caught you,” she, delusional, muttered as she pointed a stray finger at him, her eyes closing. “Trying to recruit me.”

“Guilty as charged. Gotta make a living somehow.”

“Well I’m never coming back here again so don’t put your hopes in me,” she sighed, opening her eyes and rubbing her furrowed forehead as Azriel laughed again. He had a handsome laugh, too. Not fair _at all._

“Another lost client, man,” he shook his head. Elain used the shelter of having fainted to watch him. “Told you, your gym will shut down if you don’t make a move to save it.”

“This is your gym?” Elain asked Cassian. He nodded, a smile on his lips as he stood, arms crossed. 

“Well I’m too tired to be embarrassed. I stand by what I said. Sorry.”

He shrugged. “It’s fine. Though I encourage you not to give up just yet.”

“Too late,” she whispered dramatically, eyes fluttering shut again. “It’s too late.”

Sighing, she swung her legs off the chair and sat up, clutching her head that turned with the rush of blood. Azriel touched her shoulder with another voiced “careful”. She liked that word from him. 

Elain glanced at the chocolate bar in her hand- a Snickers. Oh this is a semi-good day. It would go so well with some bitter coffee. 

“Thanks for everything,” she smiled at Azriel. He dropped his smile as he stared back at her -so much staring. She didn’t mind at all. She’d stare at him all day if it was all right- and glanced away, almost, almost shyly. 

She glanced at the chocolate again and bit her lip, contemplating. 

She looked up at him again -today was the day for new choices and leaving the comfort zone- and smiled her most charming smile, one she summoned with a quick prayer and enough resolution. “This chocolate would go well with some coffee. Can I treat you to some and we can share it? As a thank you.” 

Azriel rubbed his neck. “It’s my job. I’m a paramedic.” 

Elain smiled gently. “That’s not why I asked.” 

He met her steady gaze, mouth parted a little. Then he shut it and smiled. And nodded. 

Cassian spluttered somewhere in the background, but neither of them heard him, too busy enraptured in their small world of cool water, a chocolate bar, treadmills and shy bright smiles.


	15. I can't keep my hands off you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anon on tumblr requested: Elriel + "I can't keep my hands off you"
> 
> Harry Potter AU+ Ministry workers+ Elriel

The flickering flames float in the air before her eyes, parallel to the edge of her desk, casting long shadows on the desk and the wall behind her and illuminating her desk strewn with papers. Elain leans in her chair, legs crossed and twirls her pen in her hand while resting her chin in her other. Her eyes are trained on the script spread out before her, several other papers attended to and matters resolved throughout the long day at the Ministry of Magic. She glances at the wristwatch on her bony wrist and cocks an eyebrow up. She's stayed late today; she'll need to get home now. 

She pushes herself back, dropping her pen down with a yawn as she stretches her arms high over her head and smiles happily for a moment at the muscles she loosens and relieves. Sometimes she wishes she'll go on the path of becoming an Animagus cat just to get the satisfaction of a perfect stretch. 

She hears the footsteps and rustle before he makes himself known and easily smiles, turning slightly in her desk to lay eyes on the tall wizard crossing the space from the door of the department to her desk, a private smile upon his handsome face. She tilts her head as he comes to stand beside her and receives the kiss she is waiting for, bestowed with a bow and a hand on her back. 

"Hello," she smiles up at her fiance, observing him adjust against her desk and lean against it, crossing his arms over his chest. The fabric of his slim-fit trousers stretches over his muscled thighs, the gift of a view present through the slits of his robes and his forearms bulging against his shirt as the sleeves fall back to his elbow. "How was your day?"

He tilts his head back, regarding her with half-lidded eyes and a sly smile on his lips. "Eventful. Definitely not boring. You?"

"Likewise," she nods, glancing at her papers and beginning the process of packing her work up. She finds her suitcase and begins putting her papers away. "Eventful is a good word for today. There wasn't a dull moment, we had so much to do."

"Farell giving you too much again?" 

Elain perks with a smile, hugging the suitcase to her chest and holding it open with her chin. "My superior is giving me the work I deserve. It's good for me." 

Azriel smiles softly, handing her the remaining possessions, chuckling at the ink pens and gel pens. She'll always have that stance on quills and parchment and won't ever change her opinion regarding the outdated utensils. Elain slides her pens in her suitcase with the eased practice of memorised muscle action and his eyes follow her every move, transfixed. The white shirt she chose for today is a good choice, it does her justice with the pencil skirt but Azriel doesn't think he's very happy with the sheer lace bishop sleeves because it does her too much justice. He's beyond happy with the article of clothing she has on but he doesn't think he is as much as everyone else enjoying the look as much as he does. 

"Did you only just finish?" she clicks it in place and stands up, grabbing her robe from the back of her chair and sliding the garment on. He nods as he passes her the wand on the desk. 

She gives him the smile he loves when his hand lingers on her arm and tugs her forward. Elain happily steps into his embrace, her heels raising her enough to nuzzle her face in his neck, lips smiling against his skin. They fit perfectly together, each curve and angle finding its place as Elain leans into him, arms wounding around his back, hands splayed on the muscles of his back and angling her head back to meet his eyes, her eyes briefly dropping to his lips before looking back at him. 

They stand quietly like that for some stretch of time they don't know the amount of, enjoying the warm embrace and presence. Elain finds her coherent thoughts melting in his hazel mesmerising eyes. Fully familiar with his fiance's tendency to stare enchanted at the bewitching colours, he fights off the smile and stares back into her own whorls of brown and caramel gold irises. 

Elain stares lost in the colours that make up his eyes for a solid minute, tracing the electric lines of brown and green mixing together, and the trickster way they deceive the beholder with the flickering of light. She doesn't know her lips have softened into another kind of smile until she blinks out of her daze, shaking her head and meeting his expression this time and chuckling, ducking her head on his shoulder embarrassed. 

His chest vibrates with his laughter and the sound resonates into her own body pressed against his. She presses her hands on his back in answer and slides them over the fabric of his robes. 

"You need new ones," she mumbles, observing the robe and his shirt stretching over his arms and elbows that she can feel in the embrace. "They don't fit well anymore." 

"Regretfully," he muses. "But it's fine. Let's focus on your dress robes for Rhys and Feyre's wedding now."

She arches her brows high on her forehead and gives him a solid confident expression. "You forget that you need dress robes of your own."

He shrugs her concerns aside. "I'll wing it."

She pokes him in the chest briefly before settling her arms back around him. "You can't wing it. You're the groom's brother!"

"Not really."

"Az." 

He deflates under her arms. "Fine. Fine. I'll see what I can do." 

Her eyes trace the features of his face, following the hairstyle she's convinced him to adopt. She smiles internally; the swept-back look suits his face perfectly, confidently revealing the handsome features he had hid behind messy fringes and side parts back in school. Elain gives herself a pat on the back for convincing him to adopt it; the look is legendary on him. 

"Pay's good," she softly speaks, eyes flickering between his eyes and the bridge of his nose. "I'm pretty sure my promotion is on the way and you're doing great in the department. We're fine, Az." 

His arms lock around her waist, nudging her even closer as he quietly looks back at her. She can envision the cogs in his head violently turning at high speed, perfect intelligent demons when the time needs and pure demons when it's unwanted. Her fingers exercise touch on his back, stroking softly back and forth the ripples of landmark and she presses her chin to his. 

"I want you to say it," she murmurs, her lips close as they move. "I want to hear you say we're fine." 

His wrist pressing against her waist rolls on the bony joint, back and forth, his own special touches initiated due to the scarred hands that had been robbed of the gift of keen sensation. Her eyebrows knit as she looks back at him, waiting. 

"We're still growing together," she assures him quietly. "Our careers fresh still. We've got a long way to go. We're fine, Az. Say it." 

"We're fine," he sighs finally, chest heaving and falling with the action. 

Her lips twitch. "Now believe it," she commands in a whisper, looking up through thick lashes framing her eyes. His face softens at the look he receives that he can only relate to a siren's voice, and ducks his head, pressing their foreheads together. 

"We're fine," his eyes flutter shut as some tension escapes with his uttered words. "We're fine." 

"Good," Elain praises, sliding her hands to his sides, addicted to the feel of him. She drums her fingers against him, polished nails briefly reflecting the light of the flames Elain has made previously. 

"We're going to spoil you rotten," he promises, opening the hazel enchanters. "That's what I want. For us to spoil you with anything you can want."

"I'm not sure we can do that with two ministry salaries," she chuckles, pushing herself in her heels to press her lips to the skin on his cheek. Azriel curves into her as she does, arms moving to wrap around her whole as best as he can, pulling her flush against him firmly. "But you can spoil me in this way." 

His lips draw widely into a full smile, revealing a row of cleaned teeth that make his smile a touch more beautiful. Elain moves her lips to his neck, tickling the skin by fluttering her lashes and earning a delightful sound that is a cross between a laugh and a moan; Azriel's arms tighten around her more as she pulls at a spot with her lips, making her fiance tilt his head to the side, giving her wider room and in answer she moves her arms around his torso pressing herself in a bear hug before she withdraws her lips, observing the mark on his bronze skin with a smile screaming levels of her delight. She pecks it once and cheekily meets his dilated eyes. 

"Uncharted territory, Archeron," he warns, a bit breathless with a strand of his hair falling in his face. "Don't go there if you're not ready-"

"Oh shut up, sex-deity," she giggles, engaging his nose in an Eskimo kiss. "You're as shy as I am." 

His cheeks tint red and he straightens against the desk, clearing his throat. Elain feels a wicked delight in her at the state she's put him in; serious Auror Azriel Bougainvillaea of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement with his few wisely chosen words and careful actions, flustered in this state by his flowery fiance of the Muggle Liasion Office- she feels a different kind of power, one she is very positive that she loves. 

"Do you plan on letting me go anytime soon?" he asks, straightening his tie and hair. Elain grins, leaning into him and kissing his jaw. 

"I can't keep my hands off you," she murmurs against his skin between kisses. "So not really." 

In answer, Azriel grips her waist and switches their positions, hauling her up on the desk. "My back is hurting having to curve down to your height," he teases and earns a sharp slap to his chest as he rests his hands on the desk either side of her, a much more relaxing arrangement this being. He observes her and her eyes, a hesitant smile on his lips before he averts his gaze. Elain hugs him, resting her head against his shoulder and sighing softly when he sets his jaw on her own head, shuffling into the perfect embrace.

"I'm tired," she shares quietly, tracing the stitches in his robes. 

"You work hard," he answers, equally quiet. "Relax this weekend. I'll treat you." 

"Really?" she pulls his tie out and plays with it as she sits slumped against his supporting chest. "That's interesting. What are you going to do?" 

"Well," he begins, blinking at the dark space of the empty department offices. He hasn't thought of it yet; he'd said that in a spur of a moment to alleviate stress from her shoulders and make her look forward to something. "What do you think I'm doing?" 

And because she knows him so well and well enough to see through his bluffing, she smiles, the action he feels. "Hot bath? Romantic dinner? Singing Queen together?" 

He can't help the beam on his face nor the wicked thought in his head. "This Friday will be the best night of your life. I promise you that."

"Impossible," she mumbles and his heart skips a worried beat. 

"Why?" 

"The night I marry you will be." 

Curse his fluttering heart and his lovestruck illness and this horrible lovely disease of being unbelievably in love with this woman in his arms. Azriel leans back, uttering a soft "Look at me." 

Elain does, looking up at him with sleepy eyes and a tired look on her face. Azriel's hands slide under her jaw, scarred fingers splayed against her skin before he lowers his head and fits his lips against hers. 

I can't keep my hands off you, either, he thinks briefly before any thought is silenced from his head. 


	16. “I heard the commotion last night… it must have been a terrible dream.”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anonymous asked: omg i screamed at the sentence prompts ngl so maybe "I heard the commotion last night… it must of been a terrible dream" for elriel but maybe replace dream with vision to make it fit?? idk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hogwarts AU + Elriel. I regret nothing. I am sorry if this isn’t what you had in mind, Nonnie, but it was what came to my head.

For Elain Archeron, life isn’t so simple. In a way that only a fifteen-year-old’s life can be, her adolescent years aren’t what she would label as perfect –no one really does, but that’s beside the point- but a testing blend of tiresome and fortunate. She’s very reluctant on losing her bright outlook on life, but sometimes it is so hard to find the good in everything. Sometimes, she just wants to sit back like her sister Nesta does and just complain; tear down everything that’s going south, moan about misfortunes and curse like a sailor, but Elain can’t do that because she’s terrified it will not be a momentary relief rather a lifestyle that sends her emotionally plummeting into a spiral that she’s afraid of its destination.

She’s determined to be positive about everything. Still, one thing she can do without is this insistent headache in her head and the sling her arm is in.

Elain wakes up that morning to high stone arches and long, large windows with purifying sunlight streaming into the hospital wing. It brightens her mood, despite the restless sleep she’s managed to ensnare that night, and she can find it in herself to sit up in her bed while the matron makes her way over to her from an occupied bed with closed privacy curtains in brisk claps of her heels on the polished floor.

“Morning,” Elain says hoarsely with a smile at Madam Pomfrey as she reaches her. The matron provides her with a special smile for her favorite patient.

“Good morning. You’re awake, good. Let me see that arm.”

Elain obediently holds out her elbow and lets the matron remove the sling from around her neck and arm, revealing the tightly bound arm of the fifteen-year-old. The matron unwinds the bandages with a flick of her wand, and spends a few moments feeling around Elain’s arm for any remaining fractures. Elain’s arm feels normal, though it twinges at the elbow joint.

“All set,” the matron confirms, releasing her arm. “How’s your head?”

The throbbing ache that had made Elain fall down the stairs yesterday has scattered completely thanks to Madam Pomfrey’s potion which Elain hopes she will continue to give her for the rest of her life.

“Better now,” she nods, unbound wavy hair lazily complying with the motion.

“Did you sleep well?”

Elain’s eyes flitter away from the healer’s expecting gaze and fall to the crisp blankets bunched in her lap. “Yes, I did,” she lies softly.

“Good, good. Well,” she claps her hands together. “You can get dressed and leave in time for breakfast.”

“Okay,” nods Elain, flexing her fingers on her repaired arm. “Thank you.”

The matron walks off, leaving Elain in her pyjamas and the comfortable bed. Elain yawns as she rubs her eyes, then stretches her arms, feeling her shoulders click with the notion. Sparing the bruise that has grown over her other wrist overnight a glance, she gets to her feet and closes the privacy curtains before beginning to get dressed for her schoolday.

It’s been another dream-filled night, one that’s the unkind kind. The kind to make her thrash in bed and wake up in cold sweat with terror in her heart and tears brimming her eyes.

Like she has been doing since they began, Elain pushes the dream to the back of her mind as she buttons her shirt up and hitches her jeans higher over her waist before reaching for her grey sweater. Today’s schedule is a busy one of double Transfiguration and then Charms, then a brief period of lunch before some double Potions. The subjects combined are nasty as it is on a good year, but with her O.W.Ls they’re near insufferable. She knows of three classmates that have succumbed to frayed nerves already and has no intention of joining them, though the headaches that have been plaguing her since her first year threaten otherwise. _Positive attitude, Elain_ , she reminds herself. Others would kill to live her life, mainly her younger sister Feyre.

Making sure her yellow striped Hufflepuff tie is in place, Elain picks up her backpack from the floor and swings it over her shoulder just as she pushes the curtains open with her bruised wrist. It’s already a shade of light green and yellow, the most painful stage of the bruise, and she’s merely thankful that it’s her right wrist that won’t make writing a problem. She’ll have to make up for the lost study time of last night.

As she steps out from the borderless room that had been her personal space, she catches sight of another fellow student picking up their schoolbag.

Her lips automatically stretch at the sight of the blue and bronze scarf and the familiar tuff of black hair. “Morning,” she chirps, eyes fixed on the Ravenclaw who whirls on his heels. She is rewarded with a similar smile.

“Good morning,” comes the answer in a rich, deep voice that accompanies a pair of smiling hazel eyes belonging to the one and only Azriel Bougainvillea.

Wordlessly, the pair walk together out of the hospital wing; Elain with more spirit to her spine and step, and Azriel in his steady assured stroll. Elain spares the year older student but whose in her year a glance and smiles at him.

“So what are you in here for?” she asks lightly. “I didn’t see you when I came in last night.”

“Ah, I don’t put all my secrets in one basket, Archeron,” tuts Azriel, shaking his head teasingly.

“You’ve only told me _one_ ,” she drops her tone. Which is an absolute untruth if there is ever one; since knowing him in second-year, Azriel has confided in her more than she believes anyone else in his life and thus in return, she has confided in him in return “About your secret cravings.”

He drops his tone, too, mockingly. “That’s one information too many you know about me, Archeron.”

She cackles softly. “Do you think I can lure you into a trap with that, then?”

“I’d be using your pumpkin juice allergy against you, then. Don’t make me pull out the big guns.”

Elain chuckles with a fond smile. The sun is shining bright today, and the weather is clear- a miracle to cherish, for sure, and by their rotten luck they’ll be spending the day indoors and in the dungeons.

“I broke my arm,” she informs him, shaking out her left arm. “Fell down the stairs like a genius.”

Her friend turns his eyes onto her, instead of the corridor they walk down. “Well no one ever doubted your genius, Elain. Tripped?”

She hesitates. “Sort of.”

He raises an eyebrow impressively. “Curious. How would a sure-footed person like you trip?”

“Like this!” she grins and promptly throws herself in his way, an image of a fainting woman. It’s only out of confidence in his reflexes that make her put such trust in him, and sure enough the moment she does, he curses softly and catches her before she falls.

“I think you lost a few braincells when you fell,” he informs her as she rights herself, grinning. She likes Azriel, not only for his calm demeanor or his assured mindset –and certainly not excluding his enchanting eyes, black hair, bronze skin or deep voice- but also because he’s Muggle raised, just like her, and he’s what people concerned with the labels call Half-Blood. Azriel has always understood her in a way others failed to; from sneaking in Muggle stationary, using correct adresses for the teachers (“I don’t care! When they earn a P.H.D I’ll call them professors, until then they’re Miss and Mister!”), mixing both Muggle and Magical explanation of things to reach an ultimate solution (“They’re both right, and I see no reason why I shouldn’t be putting in my essay actually proven _scientific research information_!”), using Muggle expressions and all, he’s one of the few who don’t raise an eyebrow at her but compliments her for it.

She feels such kinship with him, a kind she doesn’t share with Slytherin Nesta, but it’s like there’s a part of her he has in his possession and a part of him she does too. He gets her, very well, and easily does with his observation skills and intellect that it’s impossible not to feel comfortable with him- Elain likes to think she gets him in return.

“Are you okay, though?” she asks as they walk towards the Great Hall for breakfast, pushing all merry joking aside.

His lips smile fleetingly as his eyes drop to the floor momentarily and he speaks quietly in short words. “Relapse last night.”

“Oh,” she nods, catching on quickly. “Are you feeling better?”

“Yeah,” he replies softly, not looking at her. “My memories just stirred. I couldn’t stand the dorm.”

Elain nods quietly.

“What about you?” he turns the subject around. “I came in late last night and you were there already.”

“How could you tell?”

“You were dreaming.”

Her heart begins to race in her chest and her tone is a pitch higher when she speaks. “Did I make any noise?”

“You just thrashed a lot,” he looks her in the eye steadily. “Are you fine?”

“Yes,” she mutters. “Just a dream.”

He looks like he knows more, that cursed knowing intelligent gleam in his eyes tells her so. “I heard the commotion last night. It must have been a terrible dream.”

She thinks back on it and feels the despise rising in her. She sighs helplessly, giving up and rubbing her right elbow. “I don’t know. It’s… I can’t tell.”

“What do you mean?”

Elain watches the other students making their way towards the Great Hall enviously. What smooth ideal lives they lead- no one is going for breakfast fretting about endless symbols and imageries they shouldn’t be having in her thoughts. Elain sees some of the most disturbing things imaginable in her dreams, and it doesn’t help that sometimes she reads them having happened in the newspaper. It makes her sick; how could she have dreamt it before it happening? By dreaming them, does she cause them? Is she the reason of terrible travesties striking the world?

Her dreams have pushed her to sign up for Divination and Ancient Runes, just to understand them. But the hogwash of a textbook and teacher she has for Divination helps as much as the croaking frog in the garden back home does. Ancient Runes haven’t been fruitful, either. Although entertaining and intriguing, she has yet to come across anything to meet her dreams.

“They’re strange,” she sighs. “I don’t understand them. When I have them, it doesn’t feel like normal dreams, or dreams I used to have. They’re so vivid and real, but they stay like that even after I wake up and sometimes- sometimes I see them in the day, like-“

Great. She sounds insane and loopy.

“Sorry,” she huffs. “It’s ludicrous, I know. And impossible. I’m probably exhausted.”

Her friend’s gaze is sharp as the eagle of his house, and he doesn’t seem to dismiss her words at all which Elain can’t decide if that’s a good or bad thing. “Nothing’s insane or impossible,” he shrugs shortly. “To quote my housemates, ‘ _Sod it, we know nothing’_. Maybe you’re one of a kind, Elain.”

“What, insane?” she laughs shortly. “I can’t decide who’s the mad person between us, me or you for believing me.”

“Are you lying?” he raises his brows high.

“Of course not-“

“No reason to dismiss your words, then.”

“But seeing things in the middle of the day like I can just look through a lens is-“

“Elain,” he interrupts her surely. “Elain, you are literally living a fairy tale. Magic, wands, broomsticks, ghosts, magic schools, goblins as bankers, witches and wizards- you study a subject about future seeing for crying out loud. Why the heck would one more possible thing discredit sense?”

“Because…”

“Exactly,” he nods, removing one scarred hand from the pocket of his robes to touch her elbow briefly. His eyes fall to his hand and his gaze sobers. “No one believes my family would do what they did to me, everyone thinks it’s impossible, and yet they did. What I’m saying is, discovering you’re a notch more special than others isn’t surprising and not impossible. Do you want me to remind you that I literally hear people’s thoughts and know what they’ve done without trying?”

He’s right. She knows he is, but it doesn’t help the guilty part of her.

“Az,” she begins, hesitating as they slowly move down the stairs thanks to the students in their way. “I sometimes dream things before they happen. Vividly. Do you think that because I dream them up, my _special_ talent or whatever makes them… true?”

He frowns immediately. “No,” he replies immediately. “At least I don’t think so. I have a hunch that I’ll look up in the library, but I don’t think- no. No.”

“But it’s so particular,” she whispers. “It’s unreal.”

He touches her elbow again and retracts his hand back to his pocket. “I still don’t think so. We’ll look it up. I’ll help you. If it is true, we’ll make sure you get control over it.”

They’re greeted by the morning ruckus of students having their breakfast, chattering eagerly amongst themselves. Elain catches sight of her house’s table, and spots Nesta at her own talking with a housemate and rolling her eyes at what he was saying. She glances at where Azriel’s looking; the Gryffindor table, loud and boisterous as always, and the two friends of his arguing heatedly- Cassian and Morrigan. Elain knows Azriel’s watching her, because it’s no secret to her about Azriel’s infatuation with her that began last year with the blonde girl. She sees Rhysand, a personal tormentor of hers along with Cassian for the first few years before he stopped, run over from the Slytherin table, then hopping onto the bench next to Cassian and joining in on their conversation.

“You should ask her out,” Elain suggests as Azriel’s gaze refuses to stray from the beautiful sixth year. His face colours immediately and he ducks his head.

“I never should have told you,” he mutters.

“It’s written all over your face,” she waves him off. “But you should, really. Ask her out to Hogsmead.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“I’m not!” she replies earnestly. “You really should. If she turns you down – _which she wouldn’t_ \- you still have me and your friends.”

He raises an eyebrow. “You hate my friends.”

“I don’t like them anymore than you do,” she corrects. “Their teasing is something I find hard to forget, but if they become more mature I’ll be more than just civil towards them.”

“I have a better chance asking Mor out.”

She chuckles, eyes straying to her house’s table. “Well, pray for me. Hopefully Clare will let me be just today.”

“Rhys and Cass have a higher chance than that.”

She chuckles again. “See you in Charms and Potions.”

“See you.”

She walks off to the Hufflepuff table, searching for the familiar flaming red hair of her friend Lucien before spotting it over at the Gryffindor table with Tamlin Rose. Last-minute, she whirls on her heel, calling out to Azriel who is making his way to his house’s table.

“Hey Az!” he looks over and she smiles at him. “Thank you.”

A warm smile spreads over his lips and he nods back. When Elain sits at the table, pulling toast and butter towards her along her Transfiguration textbook out of her bag, she wonders what that sudden painful squeeze her heart suffered when she urged him to ask out Morrigan was all about.


End file.
